


Hold on to me, never let me go

by AbigailKinney4life



Category: Red Dwarf, Red Dwarf (UK TV)
Genre: Angst, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, First Time, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Misunderstandings, Smut, because idiots, or friends to enemies to lovers?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-17
Updated: 2020-01-01
Packaged: 2021-02-08 05:47:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 22,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21471037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AbigailKinney4life/pseuds/AbigailKinney4life
Summary: Being a soft light hologram has its advantages, Lister thinks, because why would you waste time figuring out whether or not you want someone you can't have?When the Boys from the Dwarf visit Legion and Rimmer acquires his hard light drive, and a body, both Rimmer and Lister are forced to confront the feelings they have for one another. But because they are themselves, they mess it up in every possible way. Gratuitous Rimster.
Relationships: Dave Lister/Arnold Rimmer
Comments: 39
Kudos: 117





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> ‘I love you, I have loved you all along  
And I forgive you, for being away for far too long  
So keep breathing, cause I’m not leaving you anymore  
Believe it, **hold on to me and never let me go**.’****  
**  
**  
– Far Away, Nickelback

“Well, I’ll tell you something, Lister.” Rimmer said seriously, but his eyes were blinking independently of each other and his speech was slurred. “I’ll tell you something.” He repeated, jumbled brain desperately trying to articulate whatever was so important he had to tell Lister now.

Lister frowned, concentrating hard on the jigsaw in front of him, in an attempt to drown out the miserable, drunken ramblings of the man next to him. 

He’d been through this a thousand times before with a thousand mates, they had too much to drink and started crying about every mistake they’d made in their life. But not Rimmer, because Rimmer didn’t drink much – or ever, since he’d been resurrected as a hologram – and Lister and Rimmer were not mates, they didn’t have heart to hearts with one another. They sneered, they ribbed, they argued. They most certainly didn’t _talk_. Lister didn’t want to hear the dark thoughts that kept a dead man up in the middle of the night.

“I’d trade it all in,” Rimmer finally continued, leaning so close to Lister that the scouser would have felt his body heat if he’d had any. “All of it. My pips, my long-service medals, my swimming certificates, my telescope, my shoe trees.” _Hiccup_. “I’d trade everything in to be loved and to have been loved.”

And there it was. The reason Lister tolerated Rimmer, the reason he couldn’t despise him or laugh at him like Peterson or Todhunter, even the Cat. Because the things they hated about Rimmer was an act, a façade. Rimmer wanted the same in life as anyone else, but a mixture of a loveless childhood and a serious lack of interpersonal skills had convinced him he would never have that so it was easier to pretend he didn’t want it, to pretend authority and glory were more important than love and friendship. But Lister knew, he knew it was all baloney and that underneath all that neurosis was a normal person, just like him. 

Lister abandoned his jigsaw and turned to Rimmer, the hologram was closer than Lister had expected and their eyes met immediately. Rimmer’s gaze was drunk and uninhibited, his eyes soulful and broken and it was one of those rare moments in life that everything else, every bad quality the second technician had, every hurtful thing he’d done, all fell away. Even though those things were important, they meant nothing right now.

For the first time probably since they’d met, let alone been stranded in deep space together, Lister wanted to touch him, to have contact with this person that was a thousand miles away but he knew that if he tried, his hand would float through Rimmer’s soft light form and find nothing. Lister always wanted things he couldn’t have. He gulped, broke their gaze and looked away.  
Rimmer, drunken and unaware, stumbled over to his bunk soon after, singing dejectedly to himself and Lister tried to shy away from the anxiety broiling in his chest as he jammed jigsaw pieces into holes they didn’t fit in an attempt to make sense of the mess in front of him.

After a while, he heard soft snoring behind him.

_Smeghead_, he thought.

…

Years passed by in a matter of seconds and the length of a millennia simultaneously.  
The Cat mellowed into a far more hospitable creature, and they had found and rescued a mechanoid named Kryten who soon became a primary caregiver and insightful ally to the crew. Rimmer and Lister had somehow transformed from their oxymoron dual solitude to having a family of sorts, or more like a motley crew of beings that saved them from the cold and loneliness of deep space. The relationship between the second and third technician hadn’t changed much at all. Every time a glimmer of affection raised its head between them, their pride or selfish vanity stomped it out before it had a chance to burn. 

Being literally stuck with a person meant that you were never quite sure if you really liked them or not, or if you really needed them because you never had to consider life without them. So they had chugged along as they had always done, stuck together like limpets because that was the way things were, and never questioning if they had chosen each other, and would go on choosing each other in the face of every challenge life in deep space threw at them.

They were currently facing one such challenge. Red Dwarf was gone, stolen in the deep recesses of the big black, and the four of them had been stuck in close quarters aboard Starbug in a desperate attempt to rescue the closest thing to home they had. Tensions ran high as supplies ran low and, before he could protest, Lister watched as Rimmer’s projection dissipated in front of him.

“Yes, exactly as I thought, so primitive.” The being in front of them they would soon know as Legion mumbled to itself as it stripped Rimmer’s light bee of its components, replacing it with a more compact and sophisticated chip and throwing him back into life. Rimmer materialised immediately, his hologrammatic clothes darker than they had been before, but that was the last thing on the holograms mind. Nostrils flared and pupils dilated in anger as he pointed at his violator.

“You’d better have a mighty damn fine explanation for what you’ve just done, miladio!” 

“Forgive me.” Legion replied sanguinely. “I merely converted your projection unit from soft light to hard light.”

“Hard light?” Rimmer repeated, mouth dry, scarcely allowing himself to believe what Legion was implying. “I’ve got a body?”

Lister’s eyes travelled to Rimmer, uncertain.

“I can touch?” He questioned disbelievingly. “Feel?” The first thing he did was touch Lister, reach for him, because he was the closest person to him. There was nothing affectionate or romantic in the tactile shake he gave Lister’s shoulder but body heat scorched through the third technicians socket joint and their eyes met, Rimmer's full of delight and Lister’s full of almost sad desperation. Rimmer had a body. A body. Something Lister could touch, and all of a sudden he was forced to face something he’d been mercifully saved from when Rimmer had been soft light.

Lister couldn’t help himself, and it wasn’t just a line, he stood up on tip toes and kissed him. He pressed his lips against Rimmer’s, closed mouth, not passionate at all except fiercely passionate in its own right. His hand settled on Rimmer’s warm cheek and he lingered there. 

Rimmer froze from a mixture of what was happening and the fact that it was the first human contact he’d had in years and he’d forgotten how warm and nice and fuzzy it was. It wasn’t long before he melted into the kiss on instinct, his hand finding and settling on Lister’s waist, subconsciously inching him closer and not even thinking about what was happening, what it meant.

They parted, Rimmer’s eyes found Lister’s, curious, questioning and Lister could only stare, having no answers to offer Rimmer because he understood nothing himself. Except that, somewhere along the way, the Smegger had gotten under his skin and, for the first time, Lister could get under his.

Legion made nothing of the exchange, continuing to explain his invention of the hard light drive, nor did Kryten. The Cat was staring at Lister with a mixture of confusion and disgust, willing the human to turn to him and explain himself but he didn’t.

…

_‘You can meet your companions in the morning.’_ Lister snickered to himself as he exited the, admittedly, luxurious cell Legion had afforded him. But it was the last place he wanted to be right now. It didn’t take him long to find Rimmer’s cell but it did take a while to build up the courage to knock.

He stood, staring at the door, clenching his fists as he wondered exactly what the hell he was going to say when the, now hard light, hologram opened the door to him. They hadn’t said much to each other since the kiss, too enthralled by Legion and everything around them, but now that Lister had some time to think about what had happened, he wasn’t so sure if it had been the right thing to do.  
He scoffed at himself, _the right thing to do_, he’d only kissed him, and it wasn’t like he had put a great deal of thought into it anyway. He’d just acted, because that’s what Lister did, he went headfirst into getting what he wanted when he wanted it without much thought for the potential trauma it would cause the neurotic hologram who had stared at him with such quiet confusion Lister had done something he rarely did, he’d doubted himself.

Before he could tie himself in more knots with his own thoughts, the door opened and Rimmer stood there. He was wearing a pair of crisp beige pyjamas that were perfectly pressed but his hair was messy, curling down and covering his H as if Lister had just roused him from bed.

“Sorry.” He found himself saying. “Did I wake you up?”

“No.” Rimmer answered hollowly, “I can’t sleep. Is there a problem?”

“No, no problem.” Lister answered immediately. “I mean, aside from the insane git whose taking us all prisoner.”

Rimmer didn’t smile. So much for joking it off, then.

“Look, I wanted to have a word with you, man, while the others aren’t around, like.”

After a moment, Rimmer nodded, more to himself than to Lister, and opened the door to let Lister through. Rimmer’s room was adorned with a large double bed, rows and rows of textbooks undoubtedly on the subject of astro-navigation that neither Lister, nor Rimmer, understood, and one large desk that Rimmer lent against, stiff as a board, crossing his arms as if in protection. 

Lister didn’t like this one bit. The despondency, the fear in Rimmer’s demeanour, the way he was looking at him. He scratched his neck awkwardly before plopping down on the edge of Rimmer’s bed, uninvited, and busying himself by looking around the ‘cell’.

“Nice room, very you.” 

Rimmer didn’t respond.

Lister blew out his cheeks and tried again. “So, what’s it like having a body? Have you tried to drown yourself in mashed potato yet?”

“You kissed me.”

Lister looked at Rimmer but his face betrayed nothing, a perfect mask of hidden emotion and controlled reactions. This wasn’t the real Rimmer, it was the façade.

“Yeah.” Lister responded, mouth dry. “Yeah, I did, yeah.”

“Why?”

Lister laughed. “What do you mean, why?” He scoffed.

“I mean, why.” Rimmer repeated, uncrossing his arms and leaning forward ever so slightly. “Chucking food at me is one thing but doing _that_ is entirely different. I’ve been wracking my brains all night trying to figure out what you’d get from it.”

“Rimmer-“ Lister shook his head disbelievingly. It hadn’t occurred to him that Rimmer’s insecurities would convince him that Lister had kissed him as a joke, as a way to mock him. Now he was glad he had come, to set the record straight before Kryten or the Cat got to him first. “I kissed you because I wanted to.”

Rimmer’s mouth fell open, giving him an expression like a shocked goldfish. His whole body thrummed with so much tension that Lister could practically hear it. “But why would you want to?” It was barely audible.

Lister shrugged. _Very articulate, man_. “You’ve got a body.”

Rimmer blinked. “Oh, I see.” Was all he said. 

Rimmer apprehended his bunk mate for the longest time. The one person left in the universe he felt a genuine connection with and couldn’t help the little thrums of need coursing through his new body at the sight of him. Lister’s kiss lingered on his lips, giving him pins and needles and a warmth in his stomach he hadn’t felt in a long time. A part of him, more than a part, wanted to close the space between them and hold him again, feel that warm body against his again and never let go. It wasn’t because he wanted Lister, he told himself, but because he was lonely, because he was starved of human contact and intimacy, in the same way a starving man would eat a rotting piece of meat if they were hungry enough. Besides, Lister didn’t want him either, he’d just said it himself, he was taking advantage of a warm body in the chill of deep space. 

Rimmer began to immediately view the man in front of him as a logical opportunity presenting itself.

“Do you want it, as well?” He found himself asking and Lister smiled at him then with his hamster cheeks and bright eyes and nodded.

“No, I came here for a _chat_.”

The space between them closed embarrassingly quickly. Hands wrapped around bodies and mouths found each other, years of pent up anger, frustration and veiled lust fuelling the passionate embrace. Lister teased Rimmer’s unpractised mouth open with his tongue, slipping inside and pressing against Rimmer’s. The hologram moaned into Lister’s mouth at the heat, the feeling of being snogged with such insistence, such wanton need. Rimmer’s hands settled on Lister’s waist, gripping the younger man tightly through his soiled Long Johns and pulling his body taut against his, using his height and strength and get them as close as physically possible, to touch as much of Lister as he possibly could.

Lister keened at the hard lines of Rimmer’s chest against his own. He’d seen the man work out assiduously and it had never really occurred to him until this moment that Rimmer was fit, fuck, Rimmer was gorgeous in every way and if he weren’t such an unbelievable shit he would have had women, and men, throwing themselves at him from every direction. Lister growled at that, jealous of his own fantasy as he walked them backwards.

Rimmer let out a squeak as his back hit the hard edge of the desk. Lister pulled away from the kiss to see the superior technician grimacing.

“Sorry.” He said, but he couldn’t help grinning. “I guess you’re not used to pain, either.”

But Rimmer was far passed caring. His pupils were blown wide and he looked almost angry as he pulled Dave back in for another brain melting kiss. Lister happily let him attack his mouth for a few moments before pulling away again, smirking at Rimmer’s disapproving cluck, before he slid down Rimmer’s tall frame and came to rest on his knees, eyes level with the waistband of Rimmer’s perfectly starched pyjama bottoms and the hard line of hard light straining there.

“Listy…” It came out breathlessly but there was a definite warning tone to Rimmer’s voice, as if asking Lister not to pull his pants down and see him naked for fear of ridicule. Even though they’d been snogging and dry-humping like teenagers, a part of Rimmer’s artificial brain still believed that Lister was doing this as a joke. Lister fought down the instinctive part of himself that got offended at everything Rimmer did and tried to remember the vulnerable man who he saw every now and again, who he was seeing right now, and tried to figure out how to quell the self-hatred beast that lived in Rimmer’s brain.

“I want to suck your cock so badly it’s actually painful. Please let me, love.”

Lister could see Rimmer’s adam’s apple bob when he swallowed and took it as affirmation. He slowly slid Rimmer’s bottoms and pants down and off his legs and tossed them aside. Rimmer’s cock was pale except for an engorged head, and thicker than it was long and curved, rock hard, against his clothed stomach. 

“Pretty boy.” Lister murmured to himself as he took Rimmer in his hand, Rimmer shivered almost violently at the contact, the desk behind him the only thing stopping him from collapsing as Lister licked an experimental stripe over the head.

“Fuck, Listy!” Rimmer called out, bucking his hips instinctively and forcing his dick against Lister’s cheek. “Shit, sorry.”

Lister shook his head, grinning, as he sucked Rimmer’s cock into his mouth. Rimmer tensed, his hands grasping the edge of the desk behind him so hard that his knuckles went white. Lister’s own bouts of forced celibacy meant that when he did get the urge to wrap a hand around himself when Rimmer was out of the bunk or even sometimes snoring softly below him, his orgasms always hit him harder than normal because of the prolonged abstinence, and that was only a case of a few weeks apart. When was the last time Rimmer came? He imagined whatever Rimmer was feeling now was indescribable, and he wasn’t all that surprised when the hologram tensed in his mouth and filled him with something hot and salty that dissipated as soon as it had appeared.

Lister pulled back and sat on his ankles, more interested in the fact that Rimmer’s cum was hologrammatic than that Rimmer had just cum down his throat. Rimmer’s cock gave an abortive twitch before Rimmer was moving away, shielding himself from view as he tried to look for his underwear.

“Arn?” Lister asked – it felt weird calling him ‘Rimmer’ after that – standing up from where he was kneeling, walking over to the hologram and taking his hand in his own. Rimmer didn’t look up, but his cheeks flushed with an image of blood pooling there.

“You okay?” Lister asked. “Did that feel good?”

“Don’t patronise me, Lister.”

Lister frowned. “Patronise you? What’s wrong?”

Rimmer laughed humourlessly. “You know perfectly well what’s wrong. That… was…” Rimmer seemed to lose his ire as he lost his train of thought. “I’m sorry for doing that.”

“What, cumming?” Lister smirked, he couldn’t help it. “That’s kind of the point, you dolp.”

“Yes, but not that…you know…quickly.”

“Rimmer, when was the last time you did it? That Nirvanah girl? And besides, that wasn’t proper touch, was it, it was just light…that was nice, it was what I wanted.”

Rimmer finally looked at Lister, eyes slack and Lister took the advantage to press a long, lingering kiss to those swollen lips. His hand travelled downward and palmed the thickening appendage begging for attention.

“Besides,” he whispered against Rimmer’s hot cheek. “Seems like you’re good to go again.”

Rimmer breathed out a shaky sigh of relief and squeezed Lister affectionately. “I’m sorry, I’m a bit crazy sometimes.”

“Really? Hadn’t noticed.”

Rimmer raised his eyebrow before smiling and Lister felt himself falling. He took the hand still holding Rimmer’s and let him back to the bed, Rimmer allowed himself to be pulled and sat as Lister stood before him, stripping out of his long johns with little inhibition until he stood naked. All soft, hairless belly and thick, long cock hard and leaking against his thigh.

“Smeg.” Said Rimmer.

“You’ve seen it before.” Lister grinned.

“Yes, well, I wasn’t precisely thinking of having it inside me, was I?”

Lister raised an eyebrow and smirked in equal measure. “You want me inside you, Rimmer?”

Rimmer nodded silently and Lister lost some of his humour, he lifted Rimmer’s shirt over his head before kneeling on the bed, the mattress dipping under his weight, and letting Rimmer kiss him. 

After a few moments of nuzzling, Rimmer’s hand travelled down experimentally and loosely grasped Lister’s cock. Lister shivered, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a hand on him that wasn’t his own. He responded by sucking wantonly on Rimmer’s neck, nibbling his earlobe and whispering: “I wanna be in you so bad.”

“H…hold on.” Rimmer pushed gently until Lister got the hint and clambered off of him, lying back against the pillows and making himself comfortable while Rimmer lent down to the beside cabinet, giving Lister a good view of his pert backside. His todger gave an appreciative nod.

When Rimmer clambered back onto the bed, he was clutching a bottle of clear liquid in his hand.

“You carry that around with you?”

“Of course not, I couldn’t carry anything before this morning, could I?”

Lister’s brow furrowed. “Wait, Legion put that there?”

“Maybe he realised what we’d be up to after you couldn’t keep your hands off me earlier.”

“Shut up.” Lister responded, launching forward to bat Rimmer affectionately but the hologram caught him in a kiss, pushing him back down onto the bed and swinging one leg over him until he was straddling Lister’s waist. Their cocks brushed against each other and they both shivered in unison. 

“Fuck.” Lister breathed, reaching for the lube bottle and squirting some onto his hand. It took him a few fumbles to blindingly find Rimmer’s hole and then he was pushing a finger in all the way to the knuckle. Rimmer’s whole body shook and his hands found Lister’s chest, grasping at his shoulders as Lister stilled his hand.

“Have you done this before?” Lister asked quietly.

Rimmer shook his head. “You?”

“Yeah.” Lister replied, mouth dry. “A few times, it’s okay. I’ll go slow, it won’t hurt for long, I promise.”

“It doesn’t hurt.” Rimmer admitted through gritted teeth. “Just weird.”

By the time Lister was pumping three fingers into Rimmer, however, the look of discomfort had left the holograms face and been replaced by flushed pleasure. Eyes closed, mouth opening around soft moans as he rocked back on Lister’s hand, the third technician almost came from the sight alone.

“Fuck, you’re so gorgeous.” Lister muttered.

“Oh, smeg.” Rimmer breathed, too far gone to disagree with Lister as he was accustomed to.

“Wanna fuck you so bad.” Lister said. 

Rimmer nodded and Lister made fast work of pulling his fingers out. Rimmer’s eyes flew open and Lister looked up sheepishly at him. “Sorry.”

Rimmer shook his head and grabbed Lister’s hard cock with a confidence he hadn’t possessed before. He lifted his hips and Lister’s head fell back as he realised exactly what was about to happen. He felt Rimmer’s tight, perfect heat envelope him and it took all he had not to buck up into Rimmer but he didn’t want to hurt him so he stayed still until Rimmer sunk down all the way and stilled.

Lister rubbed his hands comfortingly along Rimmer’s stomach. The holograms unfocused eyes found his and smiled beautifully down at him. 

“Hi.” He said.

“Hi.” Lister replied.

It took Rimmer a long time to move, and when he did, it was only small rotations of his hips. The movement sent shivers running down Lister’s spine and after a while, Rimmer’s eyes slid closed and Lister felt his heart break at the look of ecstasy on his face from a few small rolls of his hips. Lister’s hands gripped Rimmer’s hips firmly and Rimmer’s eyes flew open as Lister thrust up into Rimmer’s tight heat.  
Rimmer yelled so loudly that Lister was sure Kryten and the Cat could hear it, regardless of where they were on the space station, and he circled his hips and thrust up again and the moan that fell from Rimmer’s lips was downright obscene. Lister held onto him tightly, pumping up in sharp thrusts, chasing his own release as well as anything else, until Rimmer’s hands found his chest and pushed against him.

“Stop, stop, stop.” He begged.

Lister stilled immediately, looking up in concern as Rimmer’s entire body quaked. “Oh, God, Rimmer, I’m…”

“So good, Listy, so amazing…” Rimmer breathed out shakily. “I almost came again.”

Relief washed over Lister as Rimmer clambered off of his lap, his cock slipping out of him and flopping hard and desperate against his chest. Rimmer collapsed to the bed, legs boneless, his own cock straining almost painfully between his legs.

Lister’s head was spinning, he was so close he couldn’t help wrapping a hand around himself, but he didn’t want to cum alone.

“Shit, Rimmer, fuck me, please.”

“What?” Rimmer asked.

“Please, just, do something, please.” As if to make his point, Lister rolled onto his side, hand still wrapped around himself, and Rimmer took the hint. Pressing himself against Lister’s back, it wasn’t long before his thick girth was stretching Lister open, finding that spot inside him and Lister groaned as he fisted his own dick. 

Rimmer’s thrusts weren’t particularly inspired, he only pulled out about an inch before rutting back in, keeping a near constant pressure on Lister’s prostate and it wasn’t long before Lister was spilling into his fist, his vision going white for a moment as he clenched around the thickness inside him. Rimmer responded by shuddering, his own hologrammatic seed spilling in Lister before disappearing, but it was pleasant while it lasted.

The pair lay there, panting, for a long time before Rimmer slowly pulled out of Lister and rolled onto his back, breathing heavily into the ceiling. 

“Wow.” Lister finally croaked into the pillow.

“Yeah.” Rimmer echoed somewhere beside him.

“If Legion weren’t a nutter, I’d kiss him.”

Rimmer laughed breathlessly beside him.

Lister forced himself to get up, finding the en suite bathroom and cleaning the sticky mess from his hands. He couldn’t quite believe what had just happened, it felt like he was wandering around in a dream, until he walked back into the bedroom and saw Rimmer sprawled, very much naked, on the bed.

He grinned bashfully before leaning down for his long johns. Rimmer clucked disapprovingly.

“You’re not wearing that filthy thing in bed.”

Lister straightened and looked at him. “You don’t want me to go?”

“Of course not.” Rimmer replied instantly. “Come here.”

Lister didn’t need to be told twice. He hopped back into the bed, nice and warm against his rapidly cooling skin, and felt Rimmer’s warm arms wrap around him.

It had never occurred to Lister how affectionate Rimmer might have been if he’d had the chance, and now he did. Lister was so glad he’d kissed him.

Satiated and exhausted, the pair soon fell asleep.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Warning: Homophobia. Nothing graphic.

Once safely back on Starbug and pursuing Red Dwarf, the events that had transpired with Legion seemed like a distant memory, but the impact of the creature on their lives remained.

Now that he finally had a chance to breathe, to sink back in the pilots seat and stare at the unending stars before him, Lister began to get giddy with excitement as he began to plan out exactly how he was going to do it.

He and Rimmer hadn’t gotten much of a chance to talk about their liaison on the space station as they, yet again, fought for their lives and freedom from the gestalt entity made up from their combined psyche’s – now Lister understood how Rimmer had magically produced that lubricant – but the memory of it stayed fresh in Lister’s mind, filling him with the kind of inane happiness a fresh relationship filled every fibre of your being with. Cheek splitting grins, unfazed good moods, butterflies in your stomach when you thought about them. It always surprised Lister how much like the stereotype being in love was, something indescribable and yet retold a million times simultaneously.

But more than happiness, worry threatened to take hold of him. Worry that, now they were back to their day to day lives and out of Legion’s paradise and the clutches of peril, Rimmer would forget what had happened and they would dissolve back into the way it always was between them. But Lister could touch him now, so it wasn’t enough anymore.

So Lister had decided that he would treat this as he’d treated any other romantic encounter in his life worth mentioning – Lisa Yates, Hayley Summers, Kristine Kochanski – he was going to ask Rimmer out on a date.

…

Starbug didn’t exactly afford him much room but Lister did the best he could with the midsection of the ship. The Cat was snoozing soundly in the other room and Kryten was just about to change over with Rimmer in the flight deck, giving them about as much privacy as they were likely to get until they found the Dwarf.

Lister had cobbled together what he could from their meagre supplies and made a lamb rogan josh – because he was mindful of Rimmer’s weak taste buds – and had even managed to find some white wine that would have gone with the holograms refined tastes. Dave himself turned his nose up at the swill and cracked open a can of Leopard Lager one handed and took a long gulp for dutch courage. He wasn’t exactly sure why he was nervous, he’d sat and ate with Rimmer a thousand times when he had been alive, and then sat and ate while Rimmer watched a thousand times when he was dead. This was no different.

Except it was. It was the most different thing in the world. It was Lister meekly asking the man he had feelings for to be his, in whatever capacity one could stranded in deep space, and part of him still feared Rimmer’s ridicule, even after all they’d been through.

“Listy? Kryten said you wanted to see me…good lord, what’s all this?”

Rimmer was stood in the doorway to the midsection, stripped down to a blue shirt and braces, hologrammatic ‘H’ glinting off the light and hair painstakingly parted to control the curls he so hated. He had a look of surprise etched across his features at the two plates on the table and Lister sitting there in his least smeggy clothes looking up expectantly at him.

“I made dinner.” Lister smiled, he couldn’t help himself.

“You made dinner?” Rimmer approached almost cautiously but there was humour behind it, he was building up to a jab. “Are you trying to romance someone? Because I think female space weevils have slightly higher standards, Lister.”

_There it was._

Lister rolled his eyes and took another swig of lager, kicking the chair next to him in invitation. Rimmer dutifully sat.

“Okay, I’ll bite, what’s the occasion?”

“No occasion.” Lister said too quickly, too innocently. “Just thought it would be nice for us to spend some time together, maybe pick up where we left off?” He presented the hologram with his best award winning smile, expecting at least a derivative laugh in response before Rimmer ran his hand through his hair, letting it fall over his forehead, leant back and made a crack about Lister’s curry looking like something a camel with diarrhoea would leave in the sand.

But Rimmer did none of those things, in fact, his face fell and his eyes wavered before settling uncomfortably on the table, as far away from Lister as he possibly could.

“What do you mean?” He asked evenly.

“Rimmer?” Lister asked, brow furrowed. He lent forward, abandoning his beer. “What’s up?”

“What’s up?” Rimmer echoed hollowly before finally fixing Lister with an angry stare. “What’s up would be the fact that my crazed crew mate is trying to seduce me into bed with curry and lager like a nineteen year old Geordie on a Saturday night.”

“Rimmer.” Lister repeated, firmer this time, feeling his hackles go up instinctively at the insult. “Why are you being like this? I’m trying to do something nice, get us a bit of alone time for once stuck in this garbage can with the others.”

“And why precisely would we need alone time?”

Something close to hurt spread through Lister’s chest. More like the pre-emptive fear of hurt to come. He swallowed his pride and tried again.

“Look, I know things have been a little strange since you got your body back, and what happened on the space station happened suddenly, like, but I don’t regret it, and I think it would be cool if we could…”

“Well, I do.”

Lister stopped. “What?”

“I do regret it.” Rimmer told him bluntly, an icy edge to his voice. His nostrils flared as he fixed Lister with a furious, albeit guarded, expression. “What happened between us, shouldn’t have happened. It was the result of poor decision making and a drunkenness on being able to touch again. Rest assured, nothing of that ilk will ever be happening again. It’s only a mercy The Cat and Kryten don’t know about it, or I’d never hear the smegging end of it.”

“What are you saying to me, Rimmer?” Lister asked measuredly, the food quite forgotten in front of them.

“I’m saying, you were a means to an end, and nothing more.”

_There _was the hurt.

They stared at each other in stalemate for the longest time. Rimmer almost looked afraid of what Lister might do.

But Lister’s mind was surprisingly blank, and he didn’t say anything.

Eventually he stood. Crossed the room. Took his can with him. Rimmer’s eyes never left his retreating back.

He plonked down next to Kryten in the pilot’s seat, staring at the same stars as before, and felt like a fool.

“Sir, are you quite alright?” Kryten asked kindly, side-eyeing Lister as he kept one eye on the road, so to speak.

“Kryts, tell me about the laundry.”

“The laundry, sir? You’ve never been interested in it before.”

“Yeah.” He wished his voice sounded less dejected. “I know, but, me clothes were folded really neatly today, tell me how you did it.”

“Well, sir, I’m so glad you asked, are you familiar with the nuvernian folding technique?”

Lister let his eyes slide shut as Kryten’s inane babble soothed him and tried to make his mind go as blank as the black in front of him.

…

Rimmer remembered it clear as day, every smegging word of it no matter how hard he tried to push it from his mind.

He was twelve years old, standing a safe distance from his stoic father and practically running to keep up with his large strides.

“That’s what you could achieve if you put your mind to it, Arnold.” His father was lecturing as they walked. “You could be where your brother is now. Come along, we don’t want to miss the shuttle.”

Rimmer hurried along. They had just come from visiting Arnold’s brother Frank at the academy. It wasn’t often Father took Arnold along for their termly visits, but Father had decided that seeing his brother in the academy would inspire Rimmer to put his head down at school, work hard and one day become an officer so his Father could be proud of him.

But all Rimmer had received was being kicked out of Frank’s dormitory so he could talk to Father and an overwhelming sense of dread that there was no way a pipsqueak like him would ever get into a place as fancy and brilliant as the Academy. Frankly, he felt sick to his stomach.

Once they reached the space shuttle to take them back to Io, the waiting room was packed with people. Rimmer’s father manoeuvred him to a seat and sat down one seat apart, to perpetuate the eternal distance between them. Rimmer, in a terrible mood, looked glumly at his surroundings to take his mind off of his father’s displeasure and that was when he saw them.

They weren’t a couple, they couldn’t have been a couple, because they were a man and a man. But they were doing the things Rimmer’s parents did, his aunts and uncles, his elder brothers and their girlfriends. Holding hands, pressed against each other and talking quietly. But they were a man and a man. Rimmer’s head span.

The shorter man, the one with blonde hair, reached up and pecked his companion on the lips. They smiled at each other. Rimmer wished he was one of them, because they looked so happy.

Father cleared his throat loudly next to him. “Keep that filthy, nasty business to yourselves in front of my son, you nancys.”

“Keep your hair on, grandad.” The blonde muttered back. “It’s the 23rd century.” With that, the pair moved away, still hand in hand.

“Disgusting, the lot of them.”

“Father, they were like you and Mother.”

“Never say such a thing again, Arnold!” His father thundered. Startled, Rimmer turned to him, his face was red with anger. Rimmer had never seen such anger on his face before, not even when he was looking at _him. _It frightened him.

“People, and I use the term lightly, like them are nothing but perverts, Arnold. They _pervert _the natural order of things. The sacred union between man and woman. They deserve to be strung up.”

The sick feeling in Rimmer’s stomach intensified. Those men hadn’t looked dangerous, but Father knew best.

“Yes, Sir.” Rimmer gulped.

Lying back in his makeshift bed in Starbug, the thirty one year old hologram played the memory over in his mind. He’d been so confused back then, raised as he had been in isolation at his home or at boarding school. It wasn’t until he’d started his training at Saturn Tech that he’d found out what being gay was, that loads of people were, even some of his classmates, and that it was no big deal.

But he still couldn’t shake the feeling there was something undeniably wrong with it. Every time he thought of being with another man, he felt that same sickness in his stomach, he saw that same red-faced anger baring down on him. It was enough to make him want to run and hide and never come back.

If his Father ever found out what had happened between him and Lister…he scoffed at himself, how could the man ever find out? He was dead, for God’s sake. But then so was Rimmer and he was still kicking around.

He burned with shame at what he’d done, at what he’d let Lister do to him. He hated the thought that he’d been with another man. He hated the insinuation that he might be attracted to Lister. But, as with all things, he hated it so much because it was true.

He’d never felt anything as intense for anyone else in his life, he’d never known someone so wholly and unreservedly as Lister. He’d never felt so safe around the man, so loved. But Lister felt none of those things, that’s why Rimmer could never tell him. All Lister had wanted from him was sex, that’s what he’d said, and Rimmer was happy to oblige. To leave the memory behind on the space station and carry on with their lives. But when Lister had propositioned him again, he hadn’t felt happy or excited like he had on the space station. He just felt used and dirty, like Lister thought so little of him he was content to use him like a sex aid whenever he felt like it while Rimmer got nothing in return.

He scoffed and sat up quickly. He was being ridiculous. He didn’t have feelings for that curry-breathed weasel that made his life a living hell. He’d just been so touch-starved for such a long time; he’d taken leave of his senses and bonked the first hot-blooded thing he’d seen. He didn’t want Lister. And he could certainly imagine life without him after being stuck together for so long, yearned for it, even.

He pushed against his own stomach experimentally, felt the solid muscle there. He had a body now. There was nothing to stop him going off on his own, finding people, finding _women _and shoving deep inside them until he spilled his seed and their stomachs swelled with…he stopped, remembering the gut-wrenching shudder Lister had let out when Rimmer came inside him, how he’d smiled at him with such contentment, such happiness. How he’d looked at him with such dejection when Rimmer had said those awful things to him. His back when he’d walked away.

Rimmer flopped back onto the bunk, eyes filling with moisture and chest constricting.

All of space before him and he only wanted Lister, and he’d had him, and then he’d done what he did with everything in his life.

He destroyed it.


	3. Chapter 3

Weeks passed and Lister and Rimmer had been avoiding each other like the plague. Lister was too hurt and too pissed off to trust himself to be alone in the same room as Rimmer in case he tried to throttle the hard light form that was causing so much chaos and Rimmer was, well, confused.

He’d only turned Dave down, as far as he was concerned, he shouldn’t have been this mad at him. But more than confused, he was scared. Scared to confront Lister, scared to confront his own feelings, scared of what the others might say: the basic size and shape of it was that he was a coward, and he’d rather just avoid Lister until the heat was off than attempt to fix things, regardless of how much he wanted to. All of which made Lister feel like Rimmer didn’t even care enough about what had happened between them to bother talking to him about it, let alone say sorry.

Unsurprisingly, they hadn’t said a word to each other.

The one saving grace they got from the whole nasty affair was that they had never been awfully close in the first instance, therefore the Cat and Kryten didn’t notice the awkwardness and didn’t bring it up in the brash way they were accustomed to from their non-human friends. At least they could suffer in silence.

They were both wrong.

Because they’d been together for such a long time, it was easy to forget that, in fact, they were close. The kind of close only the last of their kind could be. The shared quarters were gone, the casual intimacy, even the teasing. The _effort _was gone and replaced by an invisible, impregnable wall between them. Of course, everyone else noticed.

“So, what the hell is going on with Goalpost Head and Hamster Cheeks?” The Cat asked, basking in the near-solitude of the cockpit after a day of stoic silence with the four of them navigating their way through a dense asteroid field in pursuit of Red Dwarf.

“Probably fighting over something unimportant, Sir, as always.” Kryten answered distractedly from behind him. The asteroid field was beginning to thin out but the mechanoid wouldn’t relax until they were safely through.

“Have you heard their fights?” The Cat countered, not paying nearly as much attention. “The percussion section of an orchestra has to ask those suckers to keep it down. All this silence is killing me.”

Kryten pondered for a moment. The Cat was right. The human and the hologram we’re arguing, they were avoiding one another. In all his years with the crew, Kryten didn’t think he’d ever seen them fall out this badly.

“You’re right, Sir. Perhaps all they need is a little push in the right direction.”

The Cat frowned. “What are you getting at?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Kryten asked rhetorically with renewed vigour. “Yes, Mr Rimmer and Mr Lister just need to argue, to get whatever is bugging them off their chests and they’ll be right as rain in no time.”

“You want to lock them in a room together?” The Cat asked sceptically. “Kind of hard in this tin can, bud.”

The navi-com beeped, and the Cat’s attention was distracted. “Hold on, look over there, 5 clicks to the left. Some poor sucker crashed into one of those asteroids. No life signs.” He paused. “Do you reckon it’s worth seeing if they’ve got any supplies?”

…

“But I never loot derelicts.” Rimmer moaned as he pushed himself up from his seat at the table in the midsection of Star Bug, Lister safely in the cockpit, landing on the asteroid next to the spaceship abandoned there. “You know that, Kryten.”

“Indeed, sir, because you never had a hard light body.” Kryten countered tactfully, as always. “But you do now, it seems only fair that you get the chance to get off of Star Bug and stretch your legs.”

Rimmer was met with the annoyance he often felt when Kryten made a good point. Every hologrammatic fibre of bis being wanted to argue with him, but the prospect of seeing something that wasn’t Star Bug’s metal walls and escaping the back of Lister’s head when the human refused to look at him, was too enticing to turn down.

“Uh, fine, if I have to. When do we leave?”

“Oh, I won’t be accompanying you, Sir. I’ve got far too much laundry to do. According to the read outs, the derelict is very unstable, so the fewer bodies, the better. I think you’ll be best equipped to accompany Mr Lister.”

A pit opened in Rimmer’s stomach.

“What about the Cat?” He asked quickly.

“He’s asleep, Sir, and even I wouldn’t risk waking him. The last time I did that; it took me three weeks to locate my head floating around in deep space.”

Rimmer sighed loudly, this time is was genuine. He couldn’t protest anymore, unless Kryten ask why he simply refused to be around Lister or relay the information to the man himself and give the Scouser even more reason to be mad at him.

Kryten entered the makeshift sleeping quarters with a pint of full fat milk and a plate of smoked mackerel. The Cat perked up at the sight.

“Your dinner, sir.”

“Thanks, Bud.” He accepted the plate. “Hey, why do I gotta pretend to be asleep, again?”

“Simple, Sir. Now Lister and Rimmer have to explore the derelict alone, they’ll be forced to confront one another, and everything will be back together in no time.” He chuckled. “Smug mode activated.”

…

“I swear, that droid is going fruit loops.” Rimmer said more to himself as he and Lister carefully traversed the darkened corridor in the derelict spaceship. “Forcing us to explore an unstable craft on a rotting old asteroid that could collapse at any…ow!”

They shone torches in front of themselves, but it still didn’t stop Rimmer from knocking his shin on an upturned luggage case that must have been abandoned when the crew abandoned ship.

“Ow, bloody hell!” Rimmer cursed, grabbing his shin and hopping up and down in an attempt to ride out the pain that somehow seemed that much worse than when he was alive.

Somewhere in front of him in the gloom, Lister snorted. “You deserved that.”

“For what?” Rimmer demanded.

Lister’s torchlight froze.

“Raggin’ on Kryten.” He quickly clarified before making off again. “He’s no crazier than you, you just don’t like him because he’s smarter than you.”

“Lister, he’s a mechanoid. He’s not _smart, _it’s just code.”

“Yeah, well, he’s me friend, so leave him alone.”

“Oh, right.” Rimmer grumbled, putting some weight on his foot. “And I’m nothing to you, am I?”

He froze. Lister froze. Rimmer had been too caught up in their usual bickering that he hadn’t realised the implications of what he’d said until it was already out of his fat stupid mouth.

“He’s just trying to do us a favour.” Lister continued measuredly, changing the subject. “To get us talking again. They’re probably sick of us.”

“That’s rich coming from you.”

Lister’s torchlight swung around and illuminated Rimmer’s face in the darkness. The hologram grimaced before his eyes adjusted to the harsh light and he saw Lister glaring at him.

“And what the hell is that supposed to mean?” Lister demanded.

Rimmer’s mouth went dry. The last thing he wanted to do right now was get into it with Lister, especially in the middle of a decaying ship that may well fall apart under the vibration of their raised voices. But there was no going back now.

“Well, you’re the one ignoring me, aren’t you?”

“Ignoring you?” Lister repeated disbelievingly. “You are joking, right? Please tell me you’re joking.”

“What would I be joking about, Listy? You’re the one who is mad at me for whatever reason, you won’t talk, ergo, your fault.”

Lister shook his head, a look of resigned shock on his face. Like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing but still, he wasn’t surprised.

“You’re a piece of work, you know that, don’t ya?” He said. “After what you said to me, how bad you made me feel and you’re still acting like this is my fault.”

Rimmer felt his back automatically go up at Lister, at the sheer indignation on his face when he was the one who had started all of this. The anger ablaze in his hazel eyes reminded him of the fierce look on his face before he’d kissed him in his cell on Legion’s space station. The fire was one and the same.

“And you’re innocent, are you, Lister?” Rimmer countered, stepping forward and unconsciously crowding Lister against the wall, using his solid form to his advantage and forcing the human to take a step back. Surprise crossed Lister’s face.

“You think I liked being used? You think I liked that the first…encounter I’ve had in years ended up being nothing more than a sleazy hook up?” The second technician felt his face getting hot at the memory of it, the anger, the shame and the lust al embroiled together into one big mess. “How do you think that made me feel?”

Lister’s lips had devolved into a hard line. “What do you mean, RImmer?”

“You only wanted me because I had a body!” Rimmer exploded. He might have cried if he weren’t so angry. “That’s what you said!”

A little breath escaped Lister, like the anger deflating him like a balloon, before a hand migrated up and rubbed his eyes. “Arn-“ he tried, “you’re a moron, you know that?” His tone was affectionate. “I didn’t mean that, all right? I didn’t mean I wanted you _because _you had a body, I meant I could finally have you because of it.” Lister’s eyes hit the floor. “I jumped on you the second I could, man.” He mumbled.

“I…” Rimmer tried, but nothing came out. The best he could manage was: “oh.”

Before he could say anything else, a loud rumble echoed through the ship. The floor shook and Lister lost his footing, tumbling forward and heading straight for the floor grates. Rimmer grabbed him instinctively and Lister jerked at the sudden solid heat of Rimmer’s body against his own and was unwillingly transported back to being inside of him, feeling the older man coming undone around him, the look of rapture upon his face as if Lister himself were a balm to a lifetime of agony.

He glanced at Rimmer and met the holograms eyes – dark, intense – and the next thing he knew, their lips were pressed together, Rimmer coaxing Lister’s mouth open wetly and sucking on his tongue.

Lister moaned, collapsing against the hard light form holding him tight and wondering why they were so stupid, why they wasted so much time being mad at each other when they could be doing this…

After a moment, Rimmer pushed him gently away. His eyes were cast down and unfocused and Lister’s own brow furrowed, trying to figure out what could possibly be troubling the man after the most perfect kiss.

Something clicked in Lister’s mind and his gaze snapped back up to Rimmer. “Hang on, are you saying you only thought I slept with you because you were _there_?”

“Well, yes.” It was the complete, honest dejection that really got to Lister, the genuine belief in his voice. That was something you couldn’t fake. “I never thought you meant anything else. Even you have to admit, you’d never be interested in me if the crew were alive, because of Kochanski, and because we’re both men and…”

“Wait, wait, wait.” Lister interrupted, disentangling himself from Rimmer’s embrace. “Because we’re both men? What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

Rimmer sighed. “Look, before you say anything, I’m not homophobic, I think…”

“Homophobic? Rimmer, I _fucked _you.”

“Ssh!” Rimmer hissed. “Anyone could hear you!”

“What, on the abandoned derelict?” Lister quipped, backing away as far as he could in the small space. He regretted kissing him now, he felt stupid for allowing himself to fall for Rimmer _again. _“I don’t believe this, man, this is your dad talking, not you. You know how tired I am of this bullshit façade you always have on? You know how hard it is caring about someone you only see every now and again?”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Yeah, you do.” Lister countered masterfully. “You can’t pretend to me, Rimmer, because like it or not, I’m the one bloke in the universe that’s seen you, touched you. I know you, Rimmer, behind all that neurosis is a normal guy and I kind of liked him.”

“Lister, you…”

“And you know what? I never forgot.”

“Forgot what?”

“I never forgot what you said to me, years ago, even though you did. That all you ever wanted was to be loved. Well, here’s a newsflash, smeghead, you have been loved, because I love you. But that means smeg all to you because, what, I’m not the right sex?” Lister shook his head, feeling sore and used and done. He turned and carried on down the corridor, letting his hurt do the talking:

“You don’t deserve love, Rimmer.”


	4. Chapter 4

Being stuck in deep space with little to no company brought with it an inevitable melancholy, so for the members of the Red Dwarf crew to fall into periods of despondency wasn’t noteworthy, but it was noticeable, and Kryten did his best to elevate the moods of his masters, as their happiness directly affected his own.

“Good morning, Mr Rimmer, Sir.” Kryten announced happily as he walked into the makeshift bunk room with a plate of bacon and eggs, recently scavenged from a derelict slave ship in simulant space, to find Rimmer lying, very much awake, and staring dully at the ceiling.

“Morning, Kryten.” Rimmer said listlessly before falling back into silence.

That was about as much life as anyone had gotten out of Rimmer for the last couple of weeks. For some reason Kryten dare not ask about, something had sent him into a depressed slump the likes of which the crew had never seen before. Hot-headed and short-fused, Rimmer’s negative emotions tended to manifest into anger and snark, but he’d barely said two words to anyone about anything, not even to order them about. Rimmer was…well, sad.

It had engaged Kryten’s empathy chip and he found himself wishing for Mr Rimmer’s recovery. Oh, how he longed to be walking by and hear him yelling at Lister for leaving his dirty socks on the floor like the good old days.

“I’ve brought you some breakfast, Sir. Poached eggs and bacon so hard you could break teeth on it, just the way you like it.”

“I’m not hungry.”

“You simply must eat, Sir.” Kryten insisted. “To keep your strength up. It’s been a trying few days flying through simulant country and we’re not clear of it yet.”

“I don’t need to eat, Kryten, you know that.”

Kryten chuckled. “Oh, Sir, I think even you forget sometimes that you have a body now. I’ll be in the cock pit, and I expect that plate to be empty when I come back.”

Rimmer sat up and watched Kryten leave and then he was alone again. He stared dejectedly down at the plate of food, wondering exactly why the mechanoid was being so nice to him. Heaven knows he’d been horrible enough to him in the past not to warrant such kindness.

He knew why, of course, it was because he was being such a miserable bastard. It’s not like he was doing it for attention, he was just generally in a foul mood and had no energy to pretend otherwise.

_You don’t deserve love._

Lister’s words rang in his ears for the millionth time and the hologram winced. He knew Lister was right, of course, that’s why it bothered him so much. But to hear that the most empathetic and benevolent man Rimmer had ever met had given up on him – he couldn’t put it into words. He was miserable.

He shoved the breakfast away with such force that he broke the yolk of one of the eggs and watched as the golden liquid spilled onto the table. He didn’t want their kindness, he didn’t _deserve _their kindness, he deserved to be left alone like the loveless creature he was.

He’d only done what he did best, which was to mess everything up, so he had nothing and no one. He’d disappointed his father by loving Lister and lost Lister for respecting the archaic views he didn’t even agree with – it felt like the universe had somehow reset itself, that after a brief period of thinking, for a moment, that he could be a person he wasn’t and live a life he knew he’d never have, he’d suddenly come crashing down to Earth, metaphorically speaking, and remembered that he was alone – just like he deserved.

He took a deep breath and pushed himself up in front of the small mirror affixed to the wall, forcing himself to look at his own reflection. He looked tired, his curly hair was betraying him and the light glinted off of the ‘H’ permanently etched onto his forehead like a brand of his nothingness.

He didn’t like what he saw, but forced himself to keep looking, because there was only one undeniable truth about the man looking back at him – he wasn’t his father.

“I’m not good enough for you, because I’m not like you.” He told his Dad, imagining those fierce eyes baring into him, but he still took care to keep his voice low in case anyone else heard what he had to say. “But at least that means I can’t hate like you hate, and I won’t hurt him like you hurt me.” His voice shook, but he continued, even though he had to close his eyes. “I’m gay, and it’s okay.”

He’d said those words dozens of times sequestered away over the last week or so, and he’d keep repeating himself until he believed it.

…

“Cat, man, what the smeg is going on?” Lister roared, running into the cockpit and sitting down in the pilot’s seat. They’d changed course so suddenly and so hard that Lister had been thrown across the cargo hold and into a box of poppadoms. He was aware of Rimmer behind him but neither said a word to each other.

“Distress call, Bud.” The Cat explained, punching the co-ordinates into the navi-com.

“From who?” Lister asked.

“A simulant ship.” Kryten explained. “It appears to have crash landed on an Ocean Moon just below us.”

“Hang on,” Rimmer piped up. “We’re going down to rescue a simulant ship? You can’t be serious. Simulants despise humans, they’ll kill us on sight or torture us until we beg them to.”

“Call came from a prisoner.” The Cat explained. “A human they’d kept on board, apparently all the simulants died in the crash. Story holds up, too. There was only one life sign on board and it’s her.”

Lister blinked. “A human? A _her?_”

Rimmer shook his head. “And what if it’s a trap?”

“Yeah, and what if it’s not, and we leave some poor woman to die?” Lister quipped. “Give me manual.”

Rimmer stared at the back of Lister’s head as he piloted them down onto the ocean moon, towards the human woman he would undoubtedly try to bed before Rimmer’s very eyes.

He slumped back into his seat. _Fan-smegging-tastic._

…

Kryten, the Cat and Lister stepped out onto the ocean moon, the latter two clad in spacesuits, while Rimmer stayed behind, watching their progress on the monitor. The three of them approached the crashed simulant ship until they were engulfed by the smouldering wreckage and Rimmer gulped for them. Fear thrummed through his body and his hand tightened on the microphone.

“So far so good?” He asked.

“_Fine.” _The Cat, not Lister, answered.

Rimmer scowled. “Lister, are you okay?”

“_I’m fine, Rimmer, for smeg’s sake.”_

“_Can I make a suggestion?” _The Cat’s voice crackled over the intercom. _“How about you two leave your domestic out of this until we’ve made sure there aren’t any rogue simulants roaming about ready to use our intestines as musical instruments.”_

There was silence.

“Just be careful.” Rimmer finally instructed. “Keep an eye out for simulants…or better yet, abandon the whole ridiculous mission and come back.”

“_Rimmer_…”

“Fine, fine, find her and bring her back, what do I care?” He slumped back into his seat and crossed his arms.

…

It took almost an hour to laser a hole into the metal fuselage of the ship big enough to wiggle through. Once done, Kryten stepped carefully through, doing his best to clear a passageway in the debris for Lister and the Cat to follow. Their torches flickered into life but it was barely adequate to cut through the dust and smog thrown up in the crash. Lister could barely see an inch in front of his face.

“Smegging hell.” Lister said quietly. “Some crash. Rimmer, you getting visual?”

_“Yup.” _Came the short reply. _“But I can’t see any more than you can. There aren’t any life signs in range though, doesn’t look like any sims are going to jump out at you.”_

The Cat and Kryten shared a look before all three of them began picking their way through the corridor, weaving in and out of corrugated metal and scattered crates. It was a wonder there were any survivors.

Rimmer directed them to the lone heat signal in the ships hull and that was where they found her, cowering in a corner with her head in her hands, dry sobs wracking through her body. She was clothed only in a tattered grey smock and her brunette hair was matted, obscuring her face.

“Hey, hey-“ Lister tried soothingly, cautiously approaching her cowering form and proffering a fingerless-gloved hand out towards her. “The danger’s over now, we’re here to rescue ya.”

Ever so slowly, she lifted her head. A pale face came into view and dark eyes met Lister’s – large and terrified.

“Oh, God. It’s all right, sweetheart.”

“Oh, how glad we are that you’re alive and well, ma’am.” Kryten began from somewhere behind Lister. “My name is Kryten, and these are my companions, Mr David Lister and Mr Cat. We’re here to escort you from this wreckage and to our ship.”

Her eyes wavered in mistrust. “You got my distress call?”

“Course we did.” The Cat piped up, rolling his eyes. “Lucky for you all those simulants are dead, but still, we’d better skedaddle out of here sooner rather than later, we’re parked outside.”

An unexpected tear streaked down her face. “Thank you.” She said.

Lister’s heart broke at the quivering form in front of him. Who knows what she’d suffered at the hands of the insane sims who hated humans, and she was only human, she couldn’t have been much older than him. All he wanted was to get on her Starbug and get as far away from here as possible.

“I’m Dave.” He introduced. “Nice to meet you.”

She reached her hand out and grasped Lister’s, allowing herself to be pulled to her feet. She wobbled slightly but remained upright.

“I’m Lucy.”

…

“Kryten’s looking after her.” Lister said, dropping heavily into the pilot’s seat and rubbing his eyes. He felt like he’d aged ten years in a single day. “Getting her cleaned up. It’s amazing she wasn’t badly hurt, physically at least, she’s in bits.”

“Typical.” The Cat muttered. “The first woman we come across in ages and she’s human.”

“Cat.” Lister chastised. “Have a heart, man, she’s been to hell and back. It’s just lucky we found her when we did or the next sim ship to come along would have killed her.”

Rimmer stepped carefully into the cockpit and lent against the door, crossing his arms.

He couldn’t deny he felt a bit guilty at the sight of the poor woman, battered and bruised and traumatised, and all he could think about was her as a romantic rival. _This is why no one likes you._

“She’s human.” He settled on.

“Yeah, I know.” Lister agreed, the uproar seemingly causing him to momentarily forget that he was mad at Rimmer. “I was just saying, she was lucky we found her when we did.”

“It’s all a mite too convenient, isn’t it?” Rimmer thought aloud. “Knowing our luck, she’ll probably turn out to be a brain-sucking monster, or another pleasure gelf.”

“Aw, you two are a bad as each other!” Lister stood. “Some poor woman is in there having been abducted and tortured and all you can think about is how it affects you.”

The Cat and Rimmer shared a look.

“It’s embarrassing, is what it is.” Lister shook his head. “I’m gonna go check on her.”

He went for the doorway, stopping when he realised Rimmer was blocking the exit. He pretended not to notice the holograms taut biceps in his short-sleeved shirt with his arms crossed. Rimmer stood aside to let Lister pass, but Lister still managed to brush up against his front in the narrow passageway. The contact sent electric shocks up Rimmer’s body and he momentarily worried that his light bee was on the fritz.

“I knew the first female company in ages would drive him bananas.” Rimmer mused, body still tingling from the feel of Lister against him. “He’s going to be unbearable.”

“Hate to agree with you, bud, but you’re right.” The Cat agreed. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and she’ll have terrible taste and go for you instead.”

Rimmer blinked. He hadn’t even thought about that. The first female company in ages and he _wasn’t _going bananas. In fact, the more he thought about it, the more he realised that he hadn’t thought about women at all since he and Lister had…well, that. He hadn’t even had an appreciative peruse of Lister’s less than reputable magazines he left strewn on his bed, which he was accustomed to do.

He wasn’t kidding himself; he knew that Lister was attracted to women and being with a man wasn’t going to change that like it had changed it for him. He didn’t want Lister to change, but he also didn’t want him comforting a pretty little woman who was everything he couldn’t be.

“Say, just for the sake of argument,” he began, glad the Cat was looking out the window and not at him, “that I wasn’t interested.”

“Not interested?” The Cat scoffed. “You got eyes, she’s a woman, what else is there?”

Rimmer rolled his eyes, knowing immediately that he was talking to the wrong person, before turning on his heel into the midsection, finding Kryten and Lister sat with their newly showered guest.

He froze.

She was beautiful.

Not in a supermodel way but in a very natural, down to earth, girl next door kind of way. Kryten had managed to restore her matted hair the best he could, so it fell in a wavy brunette bob. Freckles were dotted meticulously on her pale cheeks and long thick lashes framed the biggest, darkest eyes Rimmer had ever seen. She was wearing one of the Cat’s fuchsia dress shirts which stopped mid-thigh, revealing pale, blotchy legs covered in bruises and her left forearm was bandaged. She couldn’t have been older than her late twenties but her injuries made her seem younger somehow.

Rimmer, to his credit, eyed her wearily.

“Unfortunately, the black box appears to be irreparably damaged.” Kryten was saying in media-res. “We must ask you what happened, ma’am.”

She looked down at her hands, wringing them together uncomfortably.

“You don’t have to.” Lister assured her quickly.

When she looked up, her eyes met Rimmer’s across the room and she frowned, like she was assessing him for a moment, before her gaze fell away. He didn’t think anything of it, new people often stared at him, he was dead, after all.

“No, it’s fine.” She said. “It’s just hard to know where to start, it’s all a bit of a blur. I was an engineer on the on the Alpha Centauri, a seeding ship heading out of the solar system on a five year mission to try and terraform new planets for human colonisation. We’d just left the milky way when all of a sudden we passed through a wormhole and ended up here in the middle of nowhere. That simulant ship shot us down and killed my crew. I survived and they took me back to their ship.” She swallowed. “Then, a few days ago, the ship came down. I don’t know how or why but when I woke up in the rubble, I was the only one there. That’s when I made the distress call and you found me.”

“So the question is, who shot you down and where are they now?” Kryten asked rhetorically.

“I don’t know exactly how to tell you this,” Lister began, leaning forward, “but we’re three million years into deep space and we’re the only two humans.” He hesitated. “Well, alive ones, anyway.”

Her eyes shot up. “Are you serious?”

He nodded. “There’s the Cat, Kryten and…Rimmer but aside from that, we’re all that’s left.”

“You’re the last human alive?”

“Well, no, not anymore.” He smiled at her, he couldn’t help it. For the first time in a long time, he felt something close to hope for his bleak future.

She smiled back instinctively and ran her hands through her hair. “Wow, I don’t know how to take all of this in. Thank you, so much, for saving me.” She reached out and grasped Lister’s hand with both of her own.

Lister squeezed back. “You’re welcome, love.” He smiled his widest, cheek-splitting smile at her and a hole opened in Rimmer’s stomach. He turned and left, he didn’t want to see anymore.

…

Lister had done his best with the cargo boxes and as many pillows and blankets as he could find to erect a makeshift bed in the cargo hold, the only space they really had where Lucy could get some privacy in a ship filled with blokes. Mech, Cat and Dead though they were.

He looked at the poor excuse for a bed and sorely missed Red Dwarf and the comfort it afforded. He could give Lucy some nice sleeping quarters, and maybe he could get away from Rimmer for five minutes…

“Hi, Dave.”

He was pulled from his reverie by a soft, melodious voice and turned to see Lucy stood there. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.” She said, looking apologetic. “Kryten said you were down here.”

“No, no, no.” Lister said. “It’s fine, I was just doing me best to make you some space.” He scratched his neck in embarrassment. “Sorry about the poor supply situation. It’s a long story but we’ve sort of lost our ship, but we’ll get it back soon, I promise.”

“Believe me, it’s perfect.” Lucy said, sitting down on the makeshift bed to make her point. “It’s not a simulant ship so in comparison it’s heaven.”

Lister smiled; he couldn’t help it. Her delirious energy at being safe and free was infectious, and it shamed him for the miserable way he’d been conducting himself since his fight with Rimmer. There really were bigger problems.

“Come sit down.” She said, patting the spot next to her. She reminded Dave of the little sister he’d never had, he found himself very protective of her. Luckily, neither the Cat nor Rimmer had made a move on her yet.

He perched next to her and inspected his dirty fingernails for a moment.

“So,” Lucy began, “that man with the H, does that mean he’s dead?”

“Yeah, his name’s Rimmer, he’s a hologram.”

“I’ve never met a hologram before.” She admitted. “It kind of freaked me out to tell you the truth.”

“Nah, Rimmer being dead isn’t the scariest thing about him, trust me.”

“Must be hard being a hologram.” She mused. “Being made out of light and not being able to touch anything.”

“Yeah.” Lister agreed shallowly, mind drawn back to his not-so-subtle brush up against Rimmer in the cockpit. He could still feel the man’s body heat on him like it had burned him. He looked at Lucy, all long hair and big eyes, and imagined she was warm as well.

“I really can’t thank you enough, Dave.” She said, blinking her big eyes at him. “I’ve been so awfully lonely the last few weeks.”

“Yeah,” Lister agreed, dry mouthed. “So…so have I.”

Before he knew what was happening, her lips were pressed against his. She was warm, pliant and smelled wonderfully of soap and whatever sweet aftershave the Cat used that still clung to his shirt.

It seemed bizarre to him, that he’d had his longest ever dry spell trapped alone in deep space and suddenly he couldn’t seem to keep people off of him, it was like he’d unwittingly contracted the sexual magnetism virus. It was a nice kiss, but not the wet lips and strong jaw he’d become accustomed to, not the fiery passion that engulfed him whenever he closed his eyes.

Still, he let her kiss him. It felt nice to be distracted from the mire of his thoughts, even if was only for a moment.

…

“Mr Rimmer, Sir, would you be so kind as to take these down to the cargo hold?” Kryten asked, shoving an armful of blankets into Rimmer’s arms before he could protest. “For Miss Lucy.”

Rimmer rolled his eyes and made his way down. She’d only been here for two minutes and everyone was already fawning over her like she was a new-born baby. Rimmer shook his head, berating himself for his jealously towards the poor woman. _Show some compassion, _his inner critic piped up.

He froze in the opening to the cargo hold, Lister was sat on the makeshift bed he’d put together, pressed against the human woman and their mouths were dancing the bolero.

_I hate you, _he decided.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Okay so I really don't want this chapter to come across as insensitive - I'm just trying to write this from the perspective of 4 lonely, cynical blokes stuck together in deep space and in-keeping with a sitcom written in the 80s
> 
> P.S Can you tell which is my favourite Rimmer look? ;)


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry the update took so long, guys, Christmas has been taking up most of my time lately. I hope more shenanigans from our two favourite dumbasses makes up for it!  
Happy holidays to you all! :):):)

She pulled away and Lister blinked.

He expected to get that goofy feeling he always got in his stomach when someone kissed him, man or woman; that giddy excitement that someone was attracted to him and the anticipation at what was likely to follow.

But, as he watched those big, dark eyes fluttering at him, the only thing that flashed across his mind was Arnold. He still felt like he was in the middle of something with the hologram, that it wasn’t over, even though the second technician had made it quite clear that he wanted nothing to do with Lister and wished that he never had in the first place.

The saddest thing was that, despite how bad Rimmer had made him feel, despite how angry he was, his feelings for the smegger were still there. They were still as strong as they’d always been and a part of him had been subconsciously wishing that Rimmer would change his mind, apologise to him and promise to love him forever. It made Lister feel pathetic, but most of all it just made him feel sad because he knew it was never going to happen and he somehow felt like he’d lost something that he’d never even had.

Maybe Rimmer _had _been right and the only reason the two were attracted to each other at all was because they were lonely. They were so touch-starved that they would go for whatever they could get. It was plausible, wasn’t it?

Yet here Lister was, staring into the eyes of a beautiful young woman, a human, her scent was still on his lips and all he wanted was for Arnold Judas Rimmer to be in her place, to look at him like that, to want him as much as she did.

_How long are you going to wait for him? _He thought to himself. _How long is eternity?_

“Dave, are you okay?” Poor, innocent Lucy asked, stroking a damaged, calloused hand on Lister’s cheek, touching him in a way Rimmer couldn’t.

No, that wasn’t right, was it? That was what all this had been about. Rimmer could touch him now, and in a way, it made things worse than before. Being a soft light hologram had its advantages, Lister thought, because why would you waste time figuring out whether or not you wanted someone you couldn’t have?

Lister had never given the small stirrings in his stomach for his bunkmate a second thought when he’d been unobtainable, because Dave lived in the now, and right now all he could think of was how he’d give anything to go back to living in denial than spend another second in pain knowing that the person he loved didn’t love him back.

So _that’s _why Rimmer did it.

“Yeah, I’m good, darl’. You okay?” He asked softly.

“I’m sorry.” She said bashfully. “I just…you’re my hero, you know that?”

He grinned; he couldn’t help himself. His natural charm pinged on like a light switch at the attention. “You’re really great, Luce, you are…” He looked down at his hands. “I don’t wanna take advantage of you, like, in your vulnerable state.”

“You’re a good man, Dave.” Fingers eased his face back to hers. “And I’m a grown woman, and I know what you want. I want you. So, what do you say?”

He wanted to run and hide from what he wanted, and the perfect opportunity had just presented itself.

“D’ya fancy a drink?”

…

Rimmer sunk into his seat in the cockpit, fuming, as the Cat sat up front piloting and Kryten was typing furiously – well, as furious as Kryten could be, anyway.

Rimmer shut his eyes and took a deep breath. God, all he wanted to do was sleep.

He couldn’t believe how he’d only just realised how tired he was. All he wanted was to be unconscious for a few hours and escape the horrid sensation in his stomach at the thought of what was happening in the cargo hold below.

“Ah, yes! I’ve cracked it.”

Rimmer’s eyes flew open. No chance of any peace and quiet, then.

“Cracked what?” The Cat asked.

“The black box recording.” Kryten supplied with a cheery bobble of the head. “I’ve managed to piece together the charred relays and recovered some of the image.”

“And?” Rimmer asked uninterestedly.

“Well, we might be able to get some intel on what brought down Miss Lucy’s ship. It’ll help us to prepare if they’re still out there.”

“Prepare?” Rimmer scoffed. “Kryten, whatever can take down a seeding ship isn’t going to be frightened of Star Bug. The best we can do is disguise ourselves as Green Peace activists with clipboards and hope they don’t come near us.”

Kryten, ignoring Rimmer’s pessimism, played what he could of the recording.

The Cat abandoned his station to join him and Rimmer folded his arms and closed his eyes again, ignoring them.

“Oh, my God.” Kryten muttered softly.

“Am I seeing what I think I’m seeing?” The Cat chimed in.

Rimmer cracked an eye open. “What? What is it?”

Neither of them answered.

Frustrated, the hologram pushed himself up and stalked to the monitor. On the screen was CCTV footage of a flight deck, the Captain and the Navigation Officer were desperately attempting to barricade the door with their own bodies as something metallic whirred and sparks flew as an electric saw cut through the alloy of the door like butter.

Rimmer frowned. “I thought it was a simulant ship.”

“It’s not, Sir.” Kryten explained grimly. “According to this recording, this ship, the one we rescued Miss Lucy from, wasn’t a simulant ship, it was the _Alpha Centauri_.”

On the screen, the door was finally blown from his hinges and a woman in battle armour wielding a laser pistol stepped through. Different though she looked, it was unmistakably Lucy.

_“Please, don’t hurt my crew!” _The Captain begged.

_“Human scum!” _Lucy sneered before shooting them both dead. She cackled before turning and leaving the flight deck.

Kryten paused the recording. Rimmer’s gaze lingered on the lifeless bodies of the officers.

“What’s going on, Kryten?” He asked, dry-mouthed.

“Best guess, sir, that wasn’t a sim ship at all, it was the seeding ship and Lucy is the simulant, the only simulant, driven insane all alone in deep space. She is a predator acting as prey, a human-hating black widow who lured the _Alpha Centauri _down onto the asteroid, killed them in cold blood and attempted to destroy the black box before assuming the identity of the chief engineer to do the same to the next human that comes along.”

All three of them shared a look.

“Lister!”

…

Lister snuck a six pack down to the cargo hold and he and Lucy had almost finished it. It was always nice meeting a lass who drank lager, not that they were few and far between, but it always made Lister feel more comfortable and less like a working-class nobody dating way out of his league. That was one of the reasons he’d fallen for Kochanski, officer though she was, she was a Glaswegian firecracker who could down a pint like no one’s business. It was looking like Lucy was much the same, just like his dream girl.

The first waves of tipsy haze were descending over Lister’s brain like fog and he grinned, savouring the anaesthetic to his troubled brain. For a moment, it didn’t feel like he was stuck on a transport vehicle in deep space alone in the universe, in fact, he wasn’t, he was with a human woman and she was smiling at him.

Their mouths met and the kiss was sloppy and languid. Her hands wrapped around his neck and pulled him closer and Lister allowed his hands to settle on her waist, surprising himself with her narrow hips and soft stomach – instinctively expecting hard solid lines and a surprisingly strength that could make every worry in his life go away.

He pulled back and she made quick work of the buttons on the front of his long johns. Lister’s forehead creased in pain and his hands found her wrists, pulling her gently away from him.

Big, surprised eyes met his and he turned his face away in shame, letting his head fall into his hands as his muddled, drunken brain tried to shy away from the turmoil there, tried to stop being so pathetic and find a calm he hadn’t known for a long time.

Lucy stared at his back, confused that the human male had spurned her advances, but took advantage of the opportunity regardless. Her hand silently slid under one of the pillows on the makeshift bed and enclosed around the barrel of the laser pistol she had stashed there. Once she’d rid the universe of this human scum, she would commandeer their ship. It was a meagre substitute for the _Alpha Centauri _but needs must. It would be far easier to acquire though, with nothing but a mechanoid, a dumb _felis sapien_ and a soft light hologram standing in her way.

The filthy human was talking again but she barely paid attention, keeping her eye on his turned back as she set her laser from _stun _to _kill_.

“I’m sorry, I can’t do this.” The human was muttering brokenly into hands from a mixture of alcohol and anguish.

She pointed the gun barrel at his head, feeling oddly like she was doing him a favour.

“It’s not fair on you,” he continued, “I still have feelings for…”

A loud _bang _startled them both as Kryten and Rimmer rushed in, twin looks of shock on their faces.

“Guys?” Lister’s head swam.

“Watch out, Mr Lister, sir!” Kryten pointed behind him.

Lister turned to see the barrel of the gun between his eyes and sobered immediately.

Everything happened very quickly.

Lister dived to his right and onto the floor. Lucy manoeuvred off of the bed and pointed the pistol down before she fired. Rimmer, not thinking, shot forward, the laser blast hit his side and was absorbed on impact. Pain unlike anything he’d felt before blossomed in his ribs where he’d been hit and his entire form flickered like a dodgy lightbulb. Surprise crossed the simulants face and Rimmer panicked, snatching the laser pistol from her lax hand and hugging it to himself.

Later, it would occur to him that he should have used it on her but right now, all he could think of was getting the weapon as far away from her as possible.

“I thought you couldn’t touch anything!” She fired off accusingly, a maniacal look in her big dark eyes.

“What?” Rimmer asked, dumbfounded.

“I wouldn’t have wasted all my efforts on this disgusting specimen if I knew you were a target too!”

“So, she does fancy you.” Lister said lamely from the floor.

Enraged, Lucy lunged for him, bypassing Rimmer completely. All the air was knocked from Lister’s body as her surprisingly heavy android frame crushed him, and her hands found his throat.

“Kryten, help!” He wheezed.

“The bandage on her arm, Mr Lister, she wouldn’t let me touch it!”

Lister’s hand tore the white bandage from her upper arm, revealing torn wires and jagged metal that crackled with electricity where she’d taken damage from the _Alpha Centauri._

“Stand aside, bud.”

Lister looked up in time to see the Cat, bazookoid cocked and ready, and shoved Lucy with all of his strength. Her hands left his neck and she fell to the floor as the Cat fired off a shot, hitting her direct in the damaged circuits. A small electrical explosion tore her arm from its socket, and she howled before collapsing back onto the floor. She didn’t get back up again.

Dropping the gun without concern, Rimmer fell to his knees next to Lister. His face betrayed nothing, and he didn’t say a word as he wrapped his arms around the Scouser. All Lister could do was quake in his arms, falling to pieces only when he was safely where he wanted to be.

“Sirs, I think it best we run you both through the medi-scan.” Kryten said from somewhere above them. “Just as a precaution.”

…

They landed on the first moon they came across, disposing of the body and the black box but keeping the laser pistol.

Lister went through the medi-scan first, coming through with a roaring bill of health, save from being a bit shaken, and was sat in the midsection with the Cat as the feline filled him in on everything they’d learned from the black box recording.

Rimmer sat on the medi-bed in the makeshift science room staring at the floor as Kryten read his results.

“Just as I suspected, sir, you’re absolutely fine.” The mechanoid informed him. “Even from taking a direct hit. Your hard-light drive is remarkably durable. Legion was right, you’re practically indestructible.”

“Thanks, Kryten.” He said quietly.

“I’ll give you a few minutes, sir, this has been a trying day.”

Kryten left the room, leaving him alone and Rimmer basked in the peace. He felt like his mind had run a marathon and his body was still thrumming like a live wire from everything that had happened. How close he, and Lister, had come to dying.

“Hey.”

Startled, Rimmer jerked his head and saw Lister stood in the doorway. He looked tired but mercifully unharmed.

“Hey.” Rimmer echoed, looking back at the floor.

“Just wanted to make sure you were okay.” Lister explained, walking into the room. “And say thanks, you know, for saving me life.”

Rimmer laughed, it was hollow a sound.

“I should say the same to you.” He finally decided on. “About telling her I was soft light and pointless to try and hurt.”

Lister scratched the back of his neck. “I didn’t even realize what I was saying.” He admitted. “She asked about your light bee and I just didn’t want to talk about it.”

Their eyes met and they stared at each other, without words to say. Rimmer knew Lister was safe, and he knew they’d survived yet another psychopath trying to kill them, bringing the grand total up to 33, but Rimmer still felt like shit. It didn’t make a difference if she were an innocent human, an insane simulant or a giant tap-dancing mongoose – Lister was going to sleep with her, because he’d moved on, and nothing could change that.

Rimmer broke their gaze, what else could he do, and merely said: “I’m glad you’re okay.”

Eyes wavering, Lister nodded and quickly stole from the room. Once outside, he let his head fall painfully against the wall.

_Ow, _he thought. _You deserved that._

He hadn’t said any of the things he’d meant to say, like _thanks Rimmer for risking your life to save my own even after the awful things I’ve said to you, I don’t deserve you and you have every right to turn your back on me because I’m nothing and you’re everything and I’m too chicken-shit to say it._

He shook his head. What the smeg was going on? Rimmer wouldn’t risk his life to save Mother Teresa, let alone Lister. Was he changing? And if so, why now? Why couldn’t he just be the same insufferable, selfish jackass he’d always been and make this easier for Lister?

…

Rimmer was tired of feeling like this; tired of the dejection, the loneliness, the lump in his throat that never went away.

He couldn’t sit around, and watch Lister fall for the next person they came across, and it wasn’t fair of him to expect otherwise.

This was the first time in his life he’d ever acted selflessly, and it sucked, it was no wonder he’d never done it before.

He shucked his braces and pulled up his shirt, palming the spot under his ribs that Lucy’s laser had hit on kill mode. It didn’t even hurt anymore, there wasn’t even a mark where it had hit. Kryten was right, of course, his hard-light drive did make him _practically_ indestructible.

He remembered the buzz that had coursed through his body when he’d been hit and the way he’d flickered only for a moment and it gave him the first faint glimmer of hope he’d felt in weeks.

His hard-light drive could be damaged.


	6. Chapter 6

They stayed grounded on the moon for the next few days.

According to Kryten, it was to assess the fuel and food supplies while they weren’t in flight but really, it was to give everyone some recovery time form their recent run in with the simulant who had tried to kill them all.

Kryten and the Cat had disposed of ‘Lucy’s’ body somewhere over the horizon while Lister had stayed as far away as possible and Rimmer, well, he hadn’t left the ops room long enough to even realise they’d landed.

Sat at a table in the _‘Bug’s _makeshift science room, and being no stranger to a toolkit, it had taken Rimmer less than three hours to deconstruct the laser pistol Lucy had used against them.

He set a crosshead screwdriver down and laid every component of the pistol meticulously on the table in front of him.

Rimmer had always had a natural eye for taking things apart and putting them back together again. It was why he was such a good technician and why he spent his days wiling away the time by fixing every broken piece of _Red Dwarf. _It wasn’t just something someone had to do, he actually enjoyed it. There was something about getting so immersed in the tiny details that always felt very cathartic for him, like it was an escape from the bigger realities of his life. Whether he was assiduously crafting a revision timetable that bordered on art or re-wiring Holly’s voice unit so she stopped announcing everything in Esperanto; he always felt an enormous amount of pleasure at making, even the tiniest of things, make sense.

He’d never forgotten the first thing he’d ever fixed. He’d been a boy, perhaps only six or seven, playing with his brothers in their botanical gardens at home on Io. John, Howard and Frank had suggested playing hide and seek and, after two and half hours, Arnold had come out of his hiding spot in a knot in a tree to find his brothers gone. They had left him. He didn’t realise it at the time, of course, he’d just assumed they had forgotten him and he took around the immense gardens trying to find them, ironically turning the game on its head.

That was when he’d come across the family gardener, Dungo as he was less than affectionately known, holding a wrench and working on pulling the lawn mower apart.

Rimmer had never really liked Dungo, and his parents had always warned him to stay away from the staff, but he stayed, hidden behind a tree, watching the thick-armed man turn the lawn mower on its head and attempt to wrench open the bottom panel with interest.

After a moment, Dungo noticed him stood there and Rimmer stepped back, expecting to be chastised and probably smacked like every time he snuck into his father’s study, but Dungo didn’t do that. He smiled at him, waved him over and called him ‘boy’. Arnold had shyly asked what he was doing and Dungo had explained that something had gotten stuck in the motor of the lawn mower and he was taking it apart to get it out. He asked if Arnold wanted to help and Arnold had been shocked. No one wanted his help, no one wanted to waste their time waiting for him to learn something he’d never tried before.

But Dungo had put the massive wrench in his hand, too heavy for him, and helped him loosen the bolts. Rimmer never forgot the feeling of immeasurable pride he felt when the bottom panel came away, they found and pulled out the stick that was stuck in there and the motor kicked into life again. He’d fixed that. For once in his life, he’d done something right. Dungo hit him on the back but it didn’t hurt like when his father did it, in fact, it sent something warm and pleasurable through his body.

Ever since that day, he’d started fixing all sorts of things around the house: radios, light switches, televisions, feeling the same sense of accomplishment and warmth every time, which was something he never felt staring at the incomprehensible gibberish in his astro-navigation revision textbooks.

Before he knew it, he’d emancipated himself from his parents and was starting a maintenance course at Saturn Tech. His parents despised him for it but Dungo probably would have been proud. He didn’t know why that thought comforted him like it did. He didn’t know it then but, looking back now, he wished it had been enough for him. He’d always imagined that, in another life where he wasn’t obsessed with being an officer to impress his father, he might have been an engineer or a technical artist and felt that warm all the time.

Now that he had the full use of his hands back, he relished the opportunity to pick up a couple of tools and tinker. He found himself humming quietly as he worked and forgot, momentarily, everything else.

He picked up the pistol’s power source between a thumb and a forefinger. It was a dark pink crystal-like rock about the size of a walnut. He frowned. He’d never seen anything like it. It glowed with electrical energy but had no power source of its own, like it was self-sustaining, somehow. Abandoning the crystal gently on the table, Rimmer moved to a monitor, trying to find anything in their limited data banks on the power source. When he found nothing, he widened his search to simulants but, as they were infamously brutal, no one who knew a great deal about them had survived long enough to write it down. Frustrated, Rimmer went back to the table and picked the crystal up, eyeing it suspiciously as if it were the crystal’s own fault that it was an enigma to him.

He closed his eyes and sighed.

…

“So, what is it?” He asked through gritted teeth.

“Well, sir-“ Kryten began, examining the crystal. “It appears to be an android-made energy source. It operates on self-sustaining electrical charges, thus having the power to disrupt any electrical wave it is used on. If weaponised and used on a human, it stops the electricity connecting their brain to their body and kills them, like a biological short-circuit.”

“But why?” Rimmer asked, eyeing the crystal with a new-found apprehension. “There are far easier ways to kill humans.”

“Best guess, sir, is that ‘Droids simply don’t account for human physiology. They live by technology, it only makes sense that they kill by it, too. It's probably why it affected your light drive the way that it did.”

Rimmer pulled a face, reminded why he had started any of this in the first place. “So,” he frowned, trying to articulate his thoughts. “Say, hypothetically of course, that if it can disrupt certain electrical connections then it can be recalibrated to destroy them?”

“I’m not following, sir.”

“I’m trying to say that maybe it could be used to penetrate a hard-light form and change a hard-light drive, perhaps to stop it from functioning correctly.”

Kryten tilted his head. “Well yes, in theory, it’s possible to use the energy source for your hypothesis, but I can’t understand why you would want to do such a thing.”

Rimmer’s head snapped to the mechanoid. He’d only just realised that he’d been so caught up in his own head that he’d been accidentally waxing lyrical in front of Kryten about something he had intended to keep a secret until it was done. He felt blood rush to his cheeks. Well, a holographic projection of blood but, regardless, he was embarrassed.

“Look, whatever you do, don’t tell Lister about this.” He pointed an accusing finger at him. “And that’s an order.”

Kryten was still staring blankly at him, as if bypassing the second technician’s usual rudeness and focusing on what he had said instead, like he somehow cared for him.

“Please.” Rimmer deflated.

“I can’t defy an order, Mr Rimmer, you know that.” Kryten said, sounding unconvinced. “Even if I don’t agree with it.”

Relief rushed through the hologram. He couldn’t imagine what Lister would say or do if he heard a word of what he’d just said. Rimmer was just glad he wasn’t nearby in this tin can with engines to overhear anyway.

Actually, now he thought about it, it was eerily quiet.

“Where is Lister, anyway?”

“He’s outside, sir.”

…

Lister was outside on the surface of the moon getting a breath of fresh air. Well, getting a breath of recycled oxygen in a spacesuit, but it was relaxing, nonetheless.

It felt good to be walking around freely and not circling the same two thousand or so square feet of _Star Bug. _In fact, the thinness of the atmosphere and light gravity made Lister relatively weightless and it wasn’t long before he and the Cat had devised a racing game which involved hopping from crater to crater and seeing who could get the furthest. The Cat missed his fifth crater and went bouncing off weightlessly in the distance and Lister had to hold onto his own thighs for support as laughter rocked through him. He felt good, and younger somehow. He silently thanked Kryten for their little holiday and the chance to stretch his legs and forget everything that had happened.

Lister sat down in a crater, aware that he was going to have to rescue the Cat at some point, but right now he was content to just relax and take it all in.

He lay back on his elbows and looked up at the stars. Planets, huge and purple, were dotted above him and crumbling rocks fought above him just outside of the atmosphere. It was beautiful, but it made him ache for home. He imagined just what he would give to be sat on his moon and be staring up at the Earth.

Still, the melancholy was a familiar ache in his soul now, it hurt but he didn’t give it much mind. One thing about being stuck in deep space with a group of lunatics was that it really made you appreciate the little things, and right now he was just grateful for the peace, especially as he was still pretty frazzled about what had happened with the simulant.

He was in shock, he supposed, but he also felt like a bit of a lemon. If he hadn’t had fallen into bed with her so quickly, he wouldn’t have nearly died, and neither would Rimmer. Smeg, he still couldn’t get over that. Rimmer had literally taken a bullet for him. Arnold Rimmer, not only the winner of the Bastard of the Year Awards but also after Lister had been a dick to him and practically shagged someone in front of him.

Lister growled. He was even boring himself with all his brooding. He couldn’t imagine how Kryten and the Cat must have felt listening to him. It didn’t matter who he fucked, or who Rimmer fucked, as a matter of fact, except that the very thought of Rimmer making that flushed face of pure pleasure as he sat on someone else’s cock made Lister want to punch the moon rock and snap it in two.

So much for peace, now he was pissed off, jealous and sporting a rage-hard-on in his space suit.

He fell flat on his back, staring up at the purple planets above him as he controlled his breathing and he felt small, because that’s what infinite space did to you, it made you small. So did coming millimetres from being killed by an insane simulant. Even Lucy’s fake backstory, bollocks though it was, had put things into perspective for him. It reminded him just how tiny and insignificant he, and his problems, were and how loving Rimmer was probably like staring down the barrel of a laser pistol, huge at the time, but soon it wouldn’t mean anything – and it wasn’t worth dying over.

Lister and Rimmer – it wasn’t going to happen. It hurt to consider, but it was true. They weren’t good for each other and given the choice, they would never see each other again, would they?

Even if they did give it a go, they would just hurt each other and Kryten and the Cat would give them eternal shit and, heaven forbid, they made it back to Earth and Rimmer realised he was only with Lister because he was stuck with him.

No, they were better off as they were. Anything had to be better than _this. _The rejection, the loneliness, the silence. To be honest, Lister missed his mate. He just wanted Rimmer to call him ‘Listy’, blather on about some boring _Risk _story and argue with him about something!

But how was he supposed to get everything back to normal if they weren’t even talking? Maybe they didn’t need to talk, maybe if Lister just started acting normally, Rimmer would forget and do the same thing? Of course, that would mean he had to accept that it was over, and soon they would forget it had ever happened, like the whole thing had been a dream and now it was time to wake up.

He caught site of a golden blob bouncing around in the distance and heaved himself up. “All right, Cat, man, I’m coming.”

…

He fetched the Cat and they made their way back inside. The Cat scurried off to fix his hair after his little adventure outside and Lister collapsed into a seat at the table in the midsection as Kryten served him dinner.

As Kryten rattled off his order of chicken vindaloo with pilau rice, a hefty stack of poppadum’s and an ice-cold margarita, Lister smiled dopily up at him. He felt a strange sense of numb calm at his decision, not peace exactly, but more like his brain had finally been switched off after weeks of working at one hundred percent.

“Enjoy, sir.”

“Thanks, Kryts.”

Kryten was halfway to the door and Lister had a forkful halfway to his mouth when Kryten froze.

“What?” Lister asked.

Kryten turned back. “I probably shouldn’t say anything, sir.”

Lister rolled his eyes and put his fork down. “Kryten.”

“But I promised, sir, I must follow orders.”

“Kryts, I helped you break your programming so you can do what you want. You want to tell me, then tell me.”

Kryten hurried back to the table and plonked down next to Lister. “I only bring it up because I think it’s important, sir.”

“Spit it out, man.”

“Well, between you and me, I’m worried about Mr Rimmer.”

Lister blinked. “Oh, yeah.” He tried disinterestedly, leaning back in his chair.

Kryten continued to prattle on and Lister forced himself to half-listen, to feign boredom with the subject matter.

_Remember how you used to not give a smeg when someone went on about Rimmer? _Lister thought. _This is exactly what you’ve got to do now. Put him from your mind. It’s the only way. Maybe have a drink?_

His mind wandered to the margarita in front of him, it was so cold there was condensation on the glass it was in. It looked good. Lister couldn’t even remember what he was supposed to be distracting himself from.

He took a nice long lug of the drink and sighed in pleasure as his brain automatically retuned into what Kryten was saying.

“…anyway, I know he’s been a bit depressed lately, but I think this is just too far. And frankly, I would be doing him a disservice by not saying anything.”

“Huh?”

“Oh, sir.” Kryten startled him by looking genuinely troubled. “Haven’t you been listening to me? Mr Rimmer is trying to destroy his light bee.”

Lister’s face fell into an unreadable mask.

“What?” He asked.

But before Kryten could even respond, Lister was on his feet, knocking his margarita carelessly to the ground and bolting in the direction of the science room, running for Rimmer as fast as he possibly could.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Well, I had a real field day trying to spell Margaritas. Thank you so much to everyone enjoying this story, I'm so grateful and I love you all :)


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Warning: Mentions of suicide, again nothing graphic

Lister dove into the make-shift science room, knocking a tray of medical instruments to the floor with a clatter.

Rimmer, sat at a table and pouring over a manual on electromagnetic pulses, jumped back in shock so fast he almost fell off his chair.

“Smegging hell, Lister. What’s going on?”

Lister came to a solid stop in front of the hologram, towering over him for once with fury in his eyes. Rimmer shrank bank.

“You’ve got a body, yeah?” The Scouser shouted. “Deal with this then, smeghead!”

He punched Rimmer, hard, across the cheek, sending the hologram hurtling backwards off his chair. He managed to catch himself before he hit the ground and backed off so violently that he hit the wall behind him with a startled squeak.

Pain exploded in Lister’s knuckles from punching the equivalent of a brick wall and he cursed, cradling his bruising hand against his chest. The pain grounded him. He lost some of his ire as his head span and he focused on willing the ache away.

When the waves of hot throbbing subsided, he came back to himself. He looked up to see Rimmer backed up against the wall, palms flat against the alloy metal with a look of surprise on his face.

“What in the _smeg was that for?” _Rimmer finally exploded, his body following the force in his voice as he pushed himself forward, squaring up to Lister with flared nostrils and clenched fists. Lister would be lying if he said the fierce look in his eyes and the strained muscles in his forearms didn’t turn him on ever so slightly. _Some coward, eh?_

Lister shook his head, he couldn’t let himself get side-tracked. Rimmer was still a coward, no matter how pissed off he got. That was why they were in this mess. Maybe if the hologram acted, took charge and slammed him against the wall and kissed the ever loving smeg out of him then they wouldn’t be fighting, they wouldn’t be miserable and Rimmer wouldn’t be trying to hurt himself. The very thought brought fresh tears to Lister’s eyes and he clenched his fists as if in defence, ignoring the pain exploding in his knuckles as he did so.

“You’re a coward, you know that?” He spat, feeling as if every single emotion he’d been keeping bottled up inside him for weeks was coming out in one big tidal wave of pain, anger, frustration and guilt. “Run away from all your problems so you don’t have to deal with them, it’s pathetic!”

He sounded angry but he was crying. It frightened Rimmer, because it meant something was very wrong. All the annoyance drained from him like someone had pulled the plug on it. Instead, he approached Lister cautiously.

“What’s wrong, Lister?”

If anything, the sudden magnanimity annoyed Lister more. How dare he be so calm when he was about to take everything from him?

“Don’t deny it, Kryten told me!” Lister changed tact almost instantly, taking two swift strides forward and enveloping Rimmer in a tight hug so quick that all the hologram could do was freeze and let it happen.

“Rimmer, why didn’t you tell me before?” He said, voice muffled, into Rimmer’s neck. “I could have helped you, even when we weren’t talkin’. You could have come to me. Oh, this is all my fault.” Rimmer felt moisture dampen the shoulder of his shirt.

Ever so gently, he eased Lister away. The third technician allowed himself to be moved but refused to let go completely, moving his grip from Rimmer’s back to his arms, settling on the second technician’s biceps and squeezing painfully, as if to reassure himself that Rimmer were actually in front of him. Now face to face, Rimmer could see Lister’s red rimmed eyes, the absolute devastation on his face.

Rimmer’s heart was racing like a rabbit escaping a starving wolf. He had never, in all their years together, everything they’d been through, seen Lister as _frightened _as he was right now.

“Listy, what is going on? What do you think is happening?”

Lister looked away. “Don’t call me that.” He begged dejectedly. “Don’t call me that then leave me.”

Rimmer frowned. “Leave you?” He asked. “I’m not leaving, where would I go?”

Lister tried to pull away but Rimmer kept him there, hands settled firmly on his waist in the way Lister remembered. Lister looked at him again, his eyes were hard and it sent a thrill up Lister’s spine.

“Lister, what did Kryten tell you?”

“He said you were trying to kill yourself.”

Hands released him and Rimmer stepped back, an unreadable look in his eyes. Lister felt eerily cold now he was no longer pressed against the hologram’s hard light form.

He watched in unease as Rimmer sat measuredly back down, rubbing his eyes like he’d somehow forgotten than Lister was in the room at all.

“Arn?” He tried.

Rimmer turned to him. “This is what happens when you teach a neurotic droid to break its programming.” He said blankly. “They betray you.”

Lister shook his head. “He only told me because he’s worried about you, because he cares about you. I mean, I’d rather know, I’d rather…”

“I’m not trying to kill myself, Lister, that’s absurd. Among other things, it’s pointless, given that I’m already dead.”

Lister blinked. “I don’t understand. Kryten said you were trying to destroy your light bee.”

Rimmer raised an eyebrow at him. “And you believed that? I’m far too selfish to take my own life. How am I supposed to become first admiral and inspire a generation of youth to follow in my noble footsteps?”

A smile escaped Lister, he couldn’t help it. Rimmer smiled too, it was a said smile.

Lister sat beside him. “So, why did he say it, then?”

Rimmer stared at his hands.

“Rimmer?”

“You weren’t supposed to know.”

“Rimmer, talk to me.”

“I’m not trying to destroy my light bee!” Rimmer admitted sharply. “Just the hard-light drive, so I can be soft light again, permanently. I was tinkering with the laser pistol the simulant used, it’s the best thing I can do without _Red Dwarf._”

Cogs turned furiously in Lister’s brain as he tried to understand what Rimmer was saying to him, trying to understand why he would want to give up such a gift, something that made him alive, made him human, but because Lister had never been particularly articulate, all that came out was:

“Eh?”

Rimmer laughed, it sounded cruel. “Hugely eloquent as ever, Lister, really getting to the nub of the matter.”

Lister knew what Rimmer was doing. He was deflecting, self-destructing, breaking Lister’s heart before Lister could break his. It was devastating, it was tragic, but it was also irritating and Lister was no better than Rimmer, not really.

He stood up quickly, pushing the chair away with such force it scrapped across the metal floor of the _Bug_. Rimmer followed, albeit gentler, but before he could do anything, Lister had swivelled, stopping them dead, shoving his finger in Rimmer’s stupid, beautiful face.

“You’re not doing this to me!” He yelled. “Are you listening? You’re not doing this to me!”

“Lister, calm down.”

“Why are you trying to be soft light again? Why are you trying to be like things were?”

“Because what’s the point of being hard-light if I can’t touch you?”

Silence fell thick and heavy like snow between them.

“What did you say?” Lister asked in disbelief.

Rimmer laughed, it was a maniacal sound. He shook his head, stepped back, then shook his head again, like he didn’t know what to do with himself, like his body was a poor conduit for the emotion trying to pour out. He ran a hand through his hair, dishevelling it from its neat parting before his hands settled on his hips and he stared at Lister, seemingly making up his mind.

“Do you have any idea how hard it’s been having you in my life?” He fired off accusingly. “Loving selflessly with all your heart, bestowing your affections on me, the single most unworthy person the universe! Do you know how unfair that is? You couldn’t just let me wallow, could you? You had to drag me up, hold me to some standard I can’t possibly meet so I let you down by existing?” His breath came out shakily. “You’re right, okay? I don’t deserve love. I don’t deserve you, I never have and I never will. Being unable to hold you, to touch you, made that easier to deal with somehow.”

Lister’s eyes narrowed in confusion. There was a lot to unpack there, more than he had to brain capacity to. He decided to focus on the one thing that stood out, the thing that concerned him.

“I thought you weren’t interested in me.” He admitted. “What with me being a bloke, an’ all.”

_Why did you say that? _He chastised himself. _Why are you making this about you?_

“No, you’re right.” Rimmer replied, as if reading his thoughts. “I guess I owe you an explanation.”

Lister shook his head. “Look, man, I shouldn’t have…”

“No, I want to tell you.” Rimmer interrupted. “I just can’t…” His brow furrowed, like he was thinking intensely.

“Legion was right, you know.” Rimmer finally decided. “He did give me everything I desired in that cell, whether he knew it or not.”

“What, me?” Lister snorted.

Rimmer winced. “Yes and no. I found out who I was in that room, and why I could never find happiness before. That’s because of you, Dave, so thank you. Genuinely. But I am sorry. I’m gay, I know that now, but I’m not there yet. I can’t give you what you need and you deserve better.”

Lister was already shaking his head. He felt like he was going to cry again. Smeg, here Rimmer was, tearing his heart out because of him. He was supposed to help Rimmer through all the shit that had fucked him up, not be a part of it. He could laugh at himself. Help him? How the smeg had Lister helped him? By ignoring him, by breaking the pieces of his already fragile mind because he got off on having it a little bit more together than him? Was Lister so desperate to have something in his isolated excuse for an existence that he was willing to knock down the people he loved to get it? That wasn’t who he wanted to be. He had to fix this, he had to.

“I didn’t mean that, Arn, I’m sorry. I was just hurt and I’m reckless and I don’t _think_…”

“It’s okay, Lister, you don’t have to say anything.” Rimmer sounded calm, exhausted. “I’ve made up my mind. I mean, look at us. Going back to the way things were, that’ll be better for both of us.”

Hadn’t Lister just decided the same thing? Wasn’t this everything he wanted?

“Please don’t do this.” Lister’s voice was barely above a whisper. Because he was ashamed? Because he was scared? Because he’d never meant anything more in his life? “Don’t never let me touch you again.”

Rimmer didn’t blink. “But, I don’t understand.” He said quietly. “You moved on, with Lucy, or whatever she was, you don’t have to-“

“I wasn’t going to sleep with her, you know.”

“What?”

Lister felt his cheeks getting hot and automatically fiddled with one of his dreads, feeling suddenly like a school-girl. “Before you lot burst in, I decided against it. I couldn’t do it to you, ya know?”

“You weren’t going to sleep with her?” Rimmer asked, dumbfounded.

Lister stopped fiddling and looked at him and his heart broke. Rimmer had a look of pure confusion on his face, like the look of a scared child being shown love for the first time and having no idea how to handle it. His gaze was slack and his cheek was reddening slightly where Lister had struck him.

“I’m sorry for hitting you.” He said lamely.

“So you should be.” Rimmer muttered, collapsing back into his seat by the table like he’d just run a marathon. Lister joined him, he felt weird standing alone, and wished sorely for a drink.

Lister was oddly reminded of Rimmer’s death day celebrations a few years ago. They’d both been drunk and Rimmer was sitting beside him as he was now, wallowing in misery at a life wasted. All Lister had wanted to do was touch him.

He reached a hand out and grasped Rimmer’s.

“I really never forgot what you said to me, about giving up everything for love.”

“I didn’t forget, either.” Rimmer admitted. “I just wanted you to think I did. I was embarrassed.”

“Don’t be.” Lister said. “When you said that to me, it was like I saw you for the first time. I remember thinking, _this is the guy, the guy no one else gets to see. _You were probably showing me because you trusted me, and I know I messed that up, but I never wanted to hurt you or laugh at you or anything like that. In fact, I remember thinking that you must have been in so much pain and I wanted to take that away, and I didn’t know why. But now I do, it’s because I chose you, it’s because my life wouldn’t be my life without you in it. I don’t know how the smeg it happened, but you’re the love of me life, Rimmer, I can’t change that, believe me I have tried…”

Rimmer leant across the table and silenced him with a kiss.

Lister let out a surprised squeak but his eyes shut automatically and his hand migrated from Rimmer’s hand to his neck, grasping at the holograms nape and pulling him closer.

Rimmer moaned low in his throat at the rough treatment but when Lister’s mouth coaxed his open and his tongue slipped inside, he quite forgot the pain and was grateful for the hand for keeping him upright.

His hands blindly found Lister’s shoulders, wrapping around him to support himself more than anything else as the Scouser continued to attack his mouth, the powerful wet force of his tongue swept against Rimmer’s and didn’t let him breathe.

It felt like a punishing kiss, a kiss of ownership and possession. It was like Lister were saying, _do you feel that? Do you feel light-headed? Like your knees are going to buckle? That’s me doing that and no one else. You’re mine, Arnold Rimmer._

When Lister finally pulled away, all Rimmer could do was suck in air raggedly. Lister looked at his still-closed eyes, his swollen lips and laboured breath and felt a swelling in his groin.

“Listy…” Rimmer attempted.

“You kissed me.” The third technician said cheekily. He was expecting a sardonic look from his superior, a disentangling of their limbs and a returned insult but what he got instead was blown pupils and red-tinged cheeks.

“You asked for it.” Rimmer growled and Lister almost felt afraid when Rimmer’s hand curled around his neck, grasping him by the scruff of his boiler suit and marching then backwards until his back hit the metal wall painfully.

“Rimmer!” Lister tried but it came out weakly. He was too curious and too turned on to protest as Rimmer shucked him out of his clothes, pulling his long johns down to his thighs and releasing his cock from its confines. It was painfully hard now, curved and leaking pre-cum against his stomach.

Rimmer knelt before him, staring at his dick like it was a beacon of light and Lister’s head hit the wall behind him. He could feel the hologram’s hot breath ghosting across his sensitive flesh and he screwed his eyes shut as he willed himself not to jizz all over his face there and then.

“Rimmer, you don’t have to do this.” He said through gritted teeth, body screaming at him when all he wanted in the world was that hot, wet heat enveloping him.

A warm hand caressed his naked thigh and Lister looked down, he met Rimmer’s eyes and that dopey smile was looking up at him.

“I want to.” He said. “I want to show you what you mean to me, I want to show you how much I’ve been thinking about this.”

_Smeg, _Lister thought as a hot, strong hand wrapped around the base of his cock. Rimmer stared at the glistening head almost questioningly before he licked an experimental stripe across the tip, lapping up the pre-cum spewing in rivulets and Lister’s entire body shook violently.

Rimmer smiled to himself before doing it again, making his tongue flat and dragging the wet base over Lister’s salty, sensitive flesh before sucking the head into his mouth with a slurping sound that definitely shouldn’t have been hot.

Lister felt like he was going to die. His knees buckled beneath him and he scrabbled desperately for something to grip on to but his fingers found nothing against the smooth metal wall. Rimmer’s hands swept down his thighs, curling around the backs of his knees and holding him steady as he buried his face in Lister’s crotch and sucked the life out of him. Lister was completely at Rimmer’s mercy as his cock was slicked with Rimmer’s spittle and sucked into the wet cavern of his mouth.

He didn’t remember when this had become a powerplay between the two of them, who could reduce the other to a shivering mess first. But then what else was it going to be? Any romance between the two was going to be competitive, playful, and selflessness disguised as selfishness as their friendship had been.

As Lister felt an accidental scrape of teeth on his glans, a burst of pain shot through his dick and he realised he was going to explode any second.

His cock slipped free from Rimmer’s mouth and he tried to cum, but with no stimulation, his cock jerked helplessly in the air a few times, hard as a rock, and all Lister could do was shake and force himself not to wank himself off onto the hologram’s smug face.

“You bastard.” Was all he said.

Rimmer smirked at him. “Sorry.” He said, but he didn’t sound sorry.

“How in the smeg have you learned to do that?” He asked the ceiling, still trying to control his rapid breathing.

Rimmer’s hands were still caressing Lister’s thighs comfortingly. “You would not believe how much porn I’ve been watching.”

Lister looked down at him, surprised at the admission as much as anything else. “What, guys?”

Rimmer nodded innocently and Lister groaned, just imagining Rimmer alone with a hand around himself, watching some guy slurp greedily around a thick cock in their mouth and imagining doing it to Lister.

His own cock twitched interestedly at the thought, still hanging achingly between them, and he could have cried.

“Rimmer, I need to cum.”

“I know.” Rimmer said soothingly. “But I want you to do it in me.”

Lister blinked, unused to this new confident Rimmer. He really had accepted that he was gay, hadn’t he? It gave Lister a small glimmer of hope for the future.

“I want you to fuck me.” Rimmer finished.

All Lister could do was nod his head before he pulled his long johns back on, took Rimmer by the hand and led him out of the science room. Kryten and the Cat were below in the cargo hold but Lister wouldn’t have cared if they were lounging around in the sleeping quarters. He would have kicked them out swiftly before kissing Rimmer like his life depended on it.

When they reached the empty sleeping quarters, Lister’s mouth melted against Rimmer’s as his hands blindly fumbled for his belt. Their kiss only broke apart long enough for Lister to pull Rimmer’s shirt over his head before finding each other again. Lister shucked his long johns off, his cock having lost some of its interest and hanging half-hard against his thigh.

The pair fell into the bottom bunk, naked, moaning low into each other’s mouths as Lister’s hand wrapped around Rimmer’s erection, hot and thick just like he remembered, and the hologram shivered before pushing Lister off him slightly.

Lister pumped Rimmer’s dick a few times as shaking hands passed him the bottle of lubricant stolen from Legion’s space station and Lister flicked the cap open. Rimmer’s hand found his wrist and stilled him. Panic spread through the Scouser, worried that Rimmer was going to tell him to stop, that he’d changed his mind and it had all been a mistake.

“I love you.” Rimmer said simply.

Rimmer laid back on the bunk and Lister settled between his legs, pushing Rimmer’s legs up to his chest until he was comfortable.

Lister spread some lubricant on his fingers before trailing down to Rimmer’s exposed hole. He stroked the dark flesh softly before meeting Rimmer’s gaze.

“You sure?” He asked quietly.

Rimmer nodded, smiling at him, and Lister sunk a digit in down to the knuckle. The breath hitched in Rimmer’s throat as Lister pumped in and out a few times, slicking him liberally with lubricant. He eased out again before pushing in a second finger and Rimmer groaned loudly before clapping a hand over his mouth.

Lister actually laughed. The ball was back in his court, now. He sunk two fingers in deep and massaged the pads of his fingers firmly on Rimmer’s prostate and watched in triumph as the hologram’s eyes rolled into the back of his head and his hips lifted instinctively off the bed. Using his free hand, Lister held Rimmer’s hip firmly down and continued his ministrations in Rimmer’s ass, almost aggressively pummelling the swollen gland inside the second technician. But the harder he did it, the more Rimmer loved it, the more his body reacted, arching violently off the bed and his cock seemed to fill before Lister’s eyes, squirting pitiful dollops of pre-cum onto his pale stomach. Lister began to wonder if he could make him cum just like this before a hand stilled his wrist and he was pulled from his thoughts.

“Sorry.” He mumbled.

“Will you please just fuck me before I burst?” Rimmer commanded.

Lister didn’t need to be told twice. His own cock had twitched back into life, marionetted by Rimmer’s mewls of pleasure, and sat hot and heavy against Rimmer’s lax and quivering hole. He sunk in like he was going home, Rimmer’s tight heat pulling him inside until his hips were flush against Rimmer’s ass.

Rimmer’s head fell back against the pillow, a look of pure bliss on his face as his eyes slid shut. Lister couldn’t help himself, he surged forward, eliciting a surprised gasp from the hologram, and captured his mouth with his own, swallowing Rimmer’s groans as he pulled out and slammed back in to the hilt, he did it again, stronger this time, forcing his entire length deep into Rimmer’s body.

“Fuck, Lister!” Rimmer wailed into his mouth. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, I can’t, I’m not going to…”

“Me neither.” Lister admitted, pulling back until he was sat on his haunches. He wrapped a hand around Rimmer’s neglected dick as he fucked short shallow thrusts into his hole. The thrusts weren’t as long and deep as before, but the angle landed firmly on Rimmer’s prostate and the sharp, unforgiving tugs on his cock was too much for him and soon he was spilling onto his own chest, mouth agape in surprised ecstasy,

Lister remembered Rimmer’s short refractory period, but he hadn’t quite remembered how quickly it took the hologram to lose control. It made him feel quite proud that he had made him come undone with nothing more than a few gentle caresses. Because, of course, that was all that Rimmer needed, so anything more would make him come utterly to pieces.

Lister wasn’t at all surprised when Rimmer’s cock barely softened in his grip. He grasped Rimmer’s hip painfully and the hologram’s eyes flew open but not quick enough to prepare himself as Lister fucked him mercilessly.

“Lister!” Rimmer shrieked. “Ugh, fuck!” Sparks of pleasure shot up Rimmer’s spine like his light bee was being frazzled. His vision went hazy as Lister rammed into him ruthlessly, pounding his poor, abused prostate and wanking his cock, tightening around the engorged head and Rimmer was cumming again, clenching tight around Lister and arching off of the bed before falling heavy and boneless, his chest heaving as his ass quivered around Lister’s stiff cock as if trying to expel it from his body.

Lister let go of Rimmer’s hip, wincing at the fingertip-shaped bruises forming there, and let Rimmer’s spent dick slip from his hand and fall limp in a pool of its own cum.

Rimmer was still shaking softly beneath him, teasing Lister’s swollen member but not giving him enough relief to send him over the edge. He groaned as he pulled out of Rimmer slowly, automatically sinking back in without thinking, sighing as his aching cock was enveloped in the tight, slick heat he needed.

Rimmer’s hands scrabbled down and pushed uselessly at Lister’s belly, no strength of his own left to push him away.

“Lister, please, it’s too much…” He sobbed as his cock twitched lamely on his belly.

Lister wanted to pull out, wrap a hand around himself and finish himself off, but the thought of pulling out of this tight, perfect heat filled him with an ache he couldn’t describe.

Wordlessly, he reached down and grasped Rimmer’s hands in his own, forcing their eyes to meet.

“Do you trust me?” He asked.

Rimmer looked like he was debating it for a moment and Lister held his breath, realising only too late what he had asked of him.

Rimmer nodded.

Without breaking their gaze, Lister lifted Rimmer’s arms above his head, holding his wrists down on either side of the pillow before sinking an inch deeper into Rimmer’s lax body. Rimmer shivered as Lister’s thick cockhead found his overstimulated prostate. The pleasure was too much to take, it was almost painful in its intensity and yet Rimmer somehow knew that Lister wasn’t going to hurt him. He just had to trust him.

Lister kept his thrusts slow and deep, sinking all the way in and dragging all the way out again, savouring this moment of pure, uninhibited connection between them, getting off on the trust Rimmer was giving him as well as the tight cavern milking him.

It wasn’t long before Lister shivered and groaned, bowing his head into Rimmer’s neck as he spilled hot white ropes deep inside of him. Rimmer’s eyes slid shut in satisfaction as the heat filled him inside, spreading through his limbs as he felt his orgasm in his core. His cock twitched, untouched, and dribbled a few dollops of white liquid between them.

Lister collapsed on top of the hologram and Rimmer had never felt more safe or warm or happy with the reassuring weight on top of him. That couple in the shuttle waiting room had nothing on this.

When Lister finally heaved himself off and rolled over, Rimmer didn’t think he’d ever move again.

Too hot in their confined bubble for blankets, the pair settled on holding each other, arms and legs tangled together as Lister let his head fall between the crevice of Rimmer’s shoulder and chin, like the space had been made for him.

“You know what I fancy?” Rimmer said sleepily, the words rumbling in his chest so Lister felt them, as well. “A lamb rogan josh.”

A smile escaped Lister. He wanted to hit Rimmer but he was too exhausted to move. “Oh, yeah? You want to try that date again?”

Rimmer angled his head until their eyes met. “If you’ll have me.” He whispered.

Lister pressed a soft kiss to his lips in response.

The comfortable silence continued for a little while until Rimmer shifted ever so slightly beneath him.

"Everything okay?" Lister asked, worried he might be cutting off some hologrammatic circulation with his body weight.

"I was just thinking," Rimmer mumbled, "what if we never find Red Dwarf?"

Lister shifted until he was resting on his elbows and looked at the hologram. He had a troubled, distant look on his face.

"Where's this come from?"

Rimmer shook his head. "Oh, nothing. I was just lying here thinking about how happy I was and how everything had worked out." He ran a hand up Lister's tricep as he spoke. "Then I realised it hasn't, has it? Because we're still trapped here chasing the Dwarf. I'm worried about what will happen if we never find it."

"We will." Lister said assuredly.

"But say we don't."

Lister rolled his eyes as he settled back against Rimmer, acquainted enough with his neurotic bed mate to know not to add fuel to the fire. Rimmer had to worry about something, it was who he was. Lister had always been the foil to that, and he presumed he always would be.

"Then we find a planet with an atmosphere or something, it'll all be okay, love."

"You can't know that for sure."

"Then tell me what to do." Lister whispered against him, refusing to let his own anxieties about the future colour an otherwise perfect moment. He didn't have any answers."Tell me what to do and I'll do it, I'll give you anything you need."

Rimmer was silent for a long moment, probably unsure if Lister were joking, or taking a moment to consider what he would ask of him, what one man in an infinite cosmos could do to improve their bleak situation.

"Just hold me." Rimmer decided. "And don't let go."

They lay there, Lister’s hand splayed across Rimmer’s hard-light chest, feeling his warmth, his heartbeat, like he was alive again, or for the first time.

Rimmer was right, of course, as he often was. Their future was uncertain, even if they did find the Dwarf, who knew what their tumultuous life had in store for them next. But he wasn't thinking about that, he left that to Rimmer, because Lister lived in the now, and right now he didnt feel scared or angry, he felt glad. For the first time since he’d woken up in that stasis booth, Lister felt glad things had turned out this way.

The End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Thank you everyone for the amazing support through this story, and a happy new year!  
So, I know this is a fairly short fic and I did think about lengthening it but then I thought the story is the story and I wouldn’t want to ruin it by unnecessarily bloating it out. I am toying with the idea of a sequel that deals with the next thing in the canonical timeline (if Red Dwarf has such a thing) which would involve the return of Ace and his recruiting our Rimmer to replace him. So if anyone would be interested in that, please let me know!


End file.
